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Mass Audubon Submits Written Comments on DEIS
LINCOLN, Mass.— Mass Audubon completed its review of the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Mineral Management Service’s Cape Wind Energy Project Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) released in January 2008. Mass Audubon’s support for the Cape Wind Project has been contingent on satisfactory resolution of key policy and biological issues that were identified in our Cape Wind Challenge (March 2006). Our final review of the new DEIS indicates that most of the conditions of our Challenge have been satisfactorily addressed. Our preliminary conclusion remains unchanged: the project would not pose an ecologically significant threat to birds and associated marine habitat, but more work needs to be done and some key data gaps remain.
Because of limitations on some of the data gathered to date, and because the Roseate Tern and Piping Plover are federally listed endangered and threatened species respectively and already at some risk of extinction, Mass Audubon requests that additional work to reduce the uncertainty about risk to these species be completed in the Final Environmental Impact Statement, Record of Decision, final permitting, and/or lease sale.
Our written comments (PDF 162 KB) focus on this remaining uncertainty. We also provide a few comments on other areas of the DEIS and provide recommendations regarding design refinements, including lighting and bird perch deterrents, and note the need for clarification in the presentation of some of the information and mitigation for the marine environment.
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