[Federal Register Volume 76, Number 193 (Wednesday, October 5, 2011)]
[Notices]
[Pages 61735-61736]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2011-25670]
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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
Fish and Wildlife Service
[FWS-R1-ES-2011-N161; 10120-1112-0000-F2]
Incidental Take Permit; Auwahi Wind Energy Generation Facility,
Maui, HI; Draft Habitat Conservation Plan and Draft Environmental
Assessment
AGENCY: Fish and Wildlife Service, Interior.
ACTION: Notice of availability; receipt of permit application.
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SUMMARY: Auwahi Wind Energy LLC (applicant), a subsidiary of Sempra
Generation, has submitted an application to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service (Service) for an incidental take permit under the Endangered
Species Act of 1973, as amended (ESA). The applicant is requesting an
incidental take permit pursuant to the ESA to authorize take of two
endangered Hawaiian bird species, one bat species, and one moth
species. The permit application includes a draft Habitat Conservation
Plan (HCP) describing the applicant's actions and the measures the
applicant will implement to minimize, mitigate, and monitor incidental
take of the Covered Species, and a draft Implementing Agreement (IA).
The Service also announces the availability of a draft Environmental
Assessment (EA) that has been prepared in response to the permit
application in accordance with requirements of the National
Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). We are making the permit application
package and draft EA available for public review and comment.
DATES: All comments from interested parties must be received on or
before November 21, 2011.
ADDRESSES: Please address written comments to Loyal Mehrhoff, Project
Leader, Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office, U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, 300 Ala Moana Boulevard, Room 3-122, Honolulu, HI
96850. You may also send comments by facsimile to (808) 792-9580.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Dawn Greenlee, Fish and Wildlife
Biologist, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (see ADDRESSES above);
telephone (808) 792-9400.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The applicant is requesting an ITP to
authorize take of the endangered Hawaiian petrel (uau, Pterodroma
sandwichensis), endangered Hawaiian goose (nene, Branta sandvicensis),
endangered Hawaiian hoary bat (opeapea, Lasiurus cinereus semotus), and
the endangered Blackburn's sphinx moth (Manduca blackburni)
(collectively these four species are hereafter referred to as the
``Covered Species'').
Availability of Documents
You may request copies of the permit application, which includes
the draft Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP), draft Implementing Agreement
(IA), and draft Environmental Assessment (EA), by contacting the
Service's Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office (see FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION CONTACT, above). These documents are also available
electronically for review on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Pacific
Islands Fish and Wildlife Office Web site at http://www.fws.gov/pacificislands.
Comments and materials we receive, as well as supporting
documentation we used in preparing the EA under NEPA, will become part
of the public record and will be available for public inspection by
appointment, during regular business hours. Before including your
address, phone number, e-mail address, or other personal identifying
information in your comment, you should be aware that your entire
comment--including your personal identifying information--may be made
publicly available at any time. While you can ask us in your comment to
withhold your personal identifying information from public review, we
cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so.
Background
Section 9 of the ESA (16 U.S.C. 1538) and Federal regulations
prohibit the take of fish and wildlife species listed as endangered or
threatened. The term ``take'' means to harass, harm, pursue, hunt,
shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, or collect, or to attempt to engage
in any such conduct. However, under section 10(a) of the ESA 16 U.S.C.
1539(a), we may issue permits to authorize incidental take of listed
fish and wildlife species. Incidental take is defined as take that is
incidental to, and not the purpose of, carrying out an otherwise lawful
activity. Regulations governing incidental take permits for threatened
and endangered species are found at 50 CFR 17.32 and 17.22. If the
permit is issued, the permittee would receive assurances under the
Service's ``No Surprises'' regulations at 50 CFR 17.32(b)(5) and 50 CFR
17.22(b)(5).
The proposed Auwahi Wind Farm Project on the island of Maui would
supply wind-generated electricity to the Maui Electric Company. The
applicant has developed a draft HCP that addresses the incidental take
of the four Covered Species that may occur as a result of the
construction and operation of the Auwahi Wind Farm Project over a
period of 25 years. In addition, the draft HCP addresses proposed
measures the applicant will implement to minimize, mitigate, and
monitor the impacts of incidental take of the Covered Species.
Covered Species
The Hawaiian petrel is a seabird that feeds in the open ocean and
breeds on Maui. After spending the winter on the open ocean, adults
return to breed at their colonial nesting grounds in the interior
mountains of Maui, beginning in March and April. Fledglings (i.e.,
young birds on their first flight to the open ocean) fly from the
nesting colony to the open ocean in the fall. Adults and fledglings are
known to collide with tall buildings, towers, power lines, and other
structures while flying at night between their nesting colonies and at-
sea foraging areas. The Hawaiian goose occurs in the vicinity of the
proposed wind energy facility and may collide with project structures.
Acoustic monitoring indicates that the Hawaiian hoary bat flies in the
area proposed for wind turbine development, and that the species may
roost on the project site. The adult Blackburn's sphinx moth feeds on
the nectar of native plants and lays its eggs on native and nonnative
vegetation.
The proposed project will result in the permanent loss of 0.3 acre
(0.1 hectare) of the Blackburn's sphinx moth native habitat and 27.2
acres (11 hectares) of degraded Blackburn's sphinx moth habitat. The
Hawaiian petrel, Hawaiian goose, and the Hawaiian hoary bat are known
to have collided with the existing wind turbine structures at the 30-
megawatt (MW) 21-turbine Kaheawa Wind Power I project currently
operating on Maui.
[[Page 61736]]
Proposed Plan
The activities proposed to be covered by the permit include the
construction and operation of a new 21-MW, eight-turbine wind energy
generation facility on the lower slopes of Haleakala Volcano in the
southern half of the Auwahi ahupuaa (i.e., watershed), in the
southeastern portion of the Island of Maui. The proposed facility will
consist of eight wind turbine generators (WTGs), a maintenance
building, an electrical substation, a battery energy storage system, an
underground electrical collection system carrying electrical power from
individual WTGs to the electrical substation, an overhead transmission
line to connect the substation to the Maui Electric Company Ltd.
transmission line, a permanent guyed meteorological monitoring tower,
and service roads to connect the new WTGs and other facilities to
existing highways. Improvements to portions of Kula Highway (referred
to as Upcountry Piilani Highway) and Papaka Road would also be made in
order to accommodate transportation of oversized project loads. The
applicant has also applied for a State of Hawaii incidental take
license under Hawaii State law. The draft HCP describes the impacts of
take associated with those activities on the Covered Species, and
proposes a program to minimize and mitigate take of each of the Covered
Species.
The applicant is proposing mitigation measures on Maui that
include: (1) Protection of a colony of breeding Hawaiian petrels on the
slopes of Haleakala from cat, mongoose, and rat predators; (2) predator
control or other management to conserve the Hawaiian goose at Haleakala
National Park; (3) development of a permanent conservation easement and
restoration of 350 acres of native forest habitat at Ulupalakua Ranch
to conserve the Hawaiian hoary bat; (4) surveys to document the
distribution and abundance of the Hawaiian hoary bat; and (5)
restoration of Blackburn's sphinx moth habitat at Ulupalakua Ranch.
This HCP incorporates adaptive management provisions to allow for
modifications to the mitigation and monitoring measures as knowledge is
gained during implementation.
Request for Comments
We specifically request information from the public on whether the
permit application meets the statutory and regulatory requirements for
issuing a permit, and identification of any aspects of the human
environment that should be analyzed in the draft EA. We are also
soliciting information regarding the adequacy of the HCP to minimize,
mitigate, and monitor the proposed incidental take of the Covered
Species and to provide for adaptive management, as evaluated against
our permit issuance criteria found in section 10(a) of the ESA, 16
U.S.C. 1539(a), and 50 CFR 13.21, 17.22, and 17.32. In compliance with
section 10(c) of the ESA (16 U.S.C. 1539(c)), we are making the permit
application package available for public review and comment for 30 days
(see DATES above).
We invite comments and suggestions from all interested parties and
request that comments be as specific as possible. In particular, we
request information and comments regarding the following issues:
(1) The direct, indirect, and cumulative effects that
implementation of any reasonable HCP alternatives could have on
endangered and threatened species;
(2) Other reasonable alternatives consistent with the purpose of
the proposed HCP as described above, and their associated effects;
(3) Measures that would minimize and mitigate potentially adverse
effects of the proposed action;
(4) Adaptive management or monitoring provisions that may be
incorporated into the alternatives, and their benefits to listed
species;
(5) Other plans or projects that might be relevant to this action;
(6) The proposed term of the Incidental Take Permit and whether the
proposed conservation program would minimize and mitigate to the
maximum extent practicable the incidental take that would be expected
to occur over twenty years;
(7) Whether the HCP meets ESA section 10(a)(2)(B) (16 U.S.C. 1539
(a)(2)(B)) issuance criteria; and
(8) Any other information pertinent to evaluating the effects of
the proposed action on the human environment.
The draft EA considers the direct, indirect, and cumulative effects
of the proposed action of permit issuance, including the measures that
will be implemented to minimize and mitigate such impacts. The EA
contains an analysis of a no action alternative (no permit issuance and
no measures by the applicant to reduce or eliminate the take of Covered
Species), and an alternative with a reduced permit term.
Authority
This notice is provided under section 10(c) (16 U.S.C. 1539(c)) of
the ESA and NEPA regulations (40 CFR 1506.6). The public process for
the proposed Federal action will be completed after the public comment
period, at which time we will evaluate the permit application, the HCP
and associated documents (including the EA), and comments submitted
thereon to determine whether or not the proposed action meets the
requirements of section 10(a) (16 U.S.C. 1539(a)) of the ESA and has
been adequately evaluated under NEPA.
Dated: September 8, 2011.
Hugh Morrison,
Acting Deputy Regional Director .
[FR Doc. 2011-25670 Filed 10-4-11; 8:45 am]
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