(The Center Square) – Washington State Governor Jay Inslee approved a review Site Certification Agreement for the Horse Heaven wind farm project in Benton County.

The project will be located just south of the Tri-Cities, where residents and local leaders are not giving up the fight against the massive wind turbine and solar panel project.

As previously reported by The Center Square, a group called Tri-Cities CARES has argued that the giant turbines, up to 671 feet tall, will destroy landscape views, endanger a fragile species (the royal hawk) and impact Native American cultural sites.

“This monster wind and solar project is designed to cover more than 72,000 acres, or more than 100 square miles of Horse Heaven Hills, too close for more than 300,000 residents,” TCC wrote.

On a Sunday Facebook mail In soliciting donations, the organization said it is launching “a legal battle to prevent the Tri-Cities from being significantly impacted by the Horse Heaven Hills Solar and Wind Project.”

Benton County, the Yakama Nation and TCC have until the end of November to file a lawsuit challenging the governor’s decision.

Based on the concerns raised and community pushback, the Energy Facilities Site Assessment Council, or EFSECmade up mostly of Washington state employees, initially recommended a scaled-down version of the project Inslee wanted.

“We thought EFSEC made a good compromise and the more objective turbines were rejected,” TCC’s Dave Sharp said in a September interview with The Center Square.

But then Governor Inslee resisted the personalized recommendations, telling EFSEC that any reduction of the project would have to be balanced with prioritizing “the state’s pressing clean energy needs.”

To the dismay of community members and local officials who opposed the project, EFSEC reviewed and reconsidered some of the original objections related to buffer zones around former endangered falcon nesting sites where they could not be located. turbines and the protection of Native American sites.

Ultimately, the council gave Inslee most of what he wanted.

On October 18 letter to EFSEC, Inslee wrote: “After considering the record, I find that the Council evaluated this application in a manner consistent with the legal requirements and the intent of the Chapter 80.50 RCWand I agree with the Council’s recommendation to approve the application. “Furthermore, I find that the Council carefully considered both the environmental impacts of the project and its consistency with land use plans and ordinances in effect in Benton County.”

In the approved plan, the buffer zone for “viable” hawk nests was reduced from 2 miles to six-tenths of a mile.

Also included in the agreement is a 1-mile buffer zone around Webber Canyon and a quarter-mile buffer zone around historic fire sites, meaning areas where fires have occurred in the past.

EFSEC told The Center Square that the revised plan would eliminate about 38 of 222 turbines from Option 1 or about 26 of 147 turbines from Option 2. The different turbine options depend on their height.

The project developer, clean energy explorerhad a mixed reaction to EFSEC’s reviews after Inslee’s rejection.

“EFSEC’s revised decision offers a path to restore wind turbines and solar panels, but does not address its flawed process for doing so, which involves the unprecedented step of subjecting substantive pre-construction decisions about the location of the infrastructure to project to an outside group that will not “Convene for several months, resulting in further delays and continued uncertainty,” a Scout spokesperson said in a September email to The Center Square.

Scout did not respond to requests for comment on Inslee’s final approval, but the company has until the end of the month to officially respond to EFSEC.

Inslee’s final decision letter made clear that he hopes to avoid further delays to the project.

“I can’t help but comment on the bigger picture: We will not meet our state’s urgent clean energy needs if the path to a final Council recommendation spans several years and contains conditional micro-location process requirements that further prolong the final approval of the location for an important part of the main components of the project,” Inslee wrote. “Timely and efficient action by the Council is essential to our mission to mitigate the impacts of climate change and provide suitable green energy alternatives.”

Meanwhile, Rep. Mary Dye, R-Pomeroy, has opposed the project from day one and now intends to support legislation that would require solar and wind projects to seek permission through EFSEC to receive approval from the commissioners and tribes of the affected counties before it can reach the governor’s desk for final approval.

“For too long, the system has been broken, disempowering local communities and undermining the hard work of county commissions, professional planning staff, and local citizens,” Dye said in a September email to The Center Square.

He went on to say: “One man, Governor Jay Inslee, is dictating the outcome for everyone – EFSEC, our local communities and all Washingtonians – as if he were the emperor. “This is not how democracy should work.”