Gateway West Transmission Line Project, Idaho Power and Rocky Mountain Power

STATUS: In progress, with opposition
 
TYPE: Transmission Line
 
OPPOSITION: Residents near Laramie Range, Northern Laramie Range Alliance, landowners in Burley, Citizens for Responsible Development
 
PROSPECTS:  Prolonged Delay 

BACKGROUND: Idaho Power and Rocky Mountain Power plan to construct and operate 11 transmission line segments that extend a total of about 1,150 miles across southern Wyoming and southern Idaho, 500 miles of which is public land managed by the BLM. The project intends to supply energy to customers by delivering electricity from existing and new generating resources, including renewable resources. The alliance opposed to the project objects to the 1E segment, the eastern-most line of the project. Alliance organizers plan to aid landowners in participating in “every state and federal planning and permitting step in the process in order to stop the 1E segment from being built.” The transmission line is also facing opposition in farmland near Burley. According to the Casper Star-Tribune, a Wyoming news source, opposition from private landowners has prompted federal regulators to take an additional five to six months in the analysis of the Gateway West Transmission Line Project. Idaho Power and Rocky Mountain Power hope to begin construction in 2011.
 
LINKS: Gateway West http://www.gatewaywestproject.com/project_info.aspx; BLM Wyoming http://www.wy.blm.gov/nepa/cfodocs/gateway_west/index.php; Stop Idaho Power http://stopidahopower.blogspot.com/2009/04/gateway-west-in-owyhee-county.html; Casper Star-Tribune http://www.trib.com/articles/2009/05/09/news/energy/doc4a062e8428e62605633140.txt and http://casperstartribune.net/articles/2009/07/17/news/wyoming/63fecc7e3f28bf35872575f60000fa04.txt