Sept. 14, 2013 – More than 350 people attended 13 public meetings/hearings hosted by the Bureau of Land Management and Western Area Power Administration regarding their Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the TransWest Express Transmission Project.

The 13 meetings – held in Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Nevada from Aug. 14-Sept. 6 – gave people in-person opportunities to learn more about the TWE Project and its benefits, review the proposed route and the agency preferred alternative route, ask questions, and provide official comments to BLM/Western for consideration as they prepare the Final Environmental Impact Statement. The Draft EIS availability was announced July 3.

People still have plenty of time to participate in the EIS process, even if they were unable to attend one of the 13 meetings/hearings. The BLM and Western are accepting comments for consideration in their Final EIS until Sept. 30, 2013, as part of a 90-day comment period.

Written comments should be e-mailed to the agencies at TransWest_WYMail@blm.gov, or mailed to:
Bureau of Land Management
TransWest Express Transmission Project
P.O. Box 20678
Cheyenne, WY 82003

The Draft EIS and the materials presented by BLM/Western at the meetings are available on the BLM documents website.

The materials presented by TransWest at the meetings are available in the company’s online Draft EIS archive.

Maps of proposed and alternate routes for the TWE Project were available for the public to review both hardcopy and online.

The TWE Project is a regional transmission system upgrade with 3,000 megawatts of capacity to deliver clean, sustainable, cost-effective electricity from Wyoming to the Desert Southwest, and its 725-mile proposed route primarily crosses federal land. TransWest Express LLC filed a right-of-way application with BLM for the TWE Project in December 2008. The BLM and Western are preparing an Environmental Impact Statement for the TWE Project, pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act.

In addition to facilitating the delivery of more renewable wind energy, the TWE Project will create construction jobs and long-term jobs, will contribute to local tax bases, and will strengthen the reliability and capacity of the western U.S. power grid. It was selected as a federal “Rapid Response Team for Transmission” project in October 2011. For more information about the TWE Project and its benefits to the electrical system, to the environment and to the economy, visit www.transwestexpress.net.

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