Agencies back out of previous denial of power plant on Indian sacred lands in Northern California

Just before the Thanksgiving holiday commemorating early cooperation with Native Americans for sharing their bounty, federal agencies took away a victory that protected the Medicine Lake Highlands, a major tribal sacred site in northern California. In the November 26th decision reversing the May 2000 denial of Calpine's Telephone Flat project, BLM and the Forest Service reopened a Traditional Cultural District to the ravages of industrial geothermal development.

Gene Preston, chairman of the Pit River Tribe, said his 2,000 members felt betrayed by the reversal and that he worried about the precedent this action was setting. He recently met for three hours with BLM director Kathleen Clarke and Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth. "They gave me a clear and open opportunity to make our case," Mr. Preston said. "But at the end, they described it as a clash of cultures. They said they recognize our culture, but also the culture of capitalism."

Geothermal leases in the Highlands were originally sold in1982 and renewed in 1998. Deborah Sivas, director of Earthjustice Environmental Law Clinic at Stanford, who represents the tribes and the Mount Shasta Bioregional Ecology Center, said those actions took place without sufficient environmental review and consultation with Indians. The November 26th decision, she said, only makes matters worse. "Nothing has changed since the decision [to deny the project] was made a couple years ago," said Sivas. "What this reversal means," said Michelle Berditschevsky of the Native Coalition, "is that decisions arrived at fair and square can be taken away through corporate pressure. Rather than defending their original decision and fighting Calpine's $100 million lawsuit, as would have been expected of a government that has a trust obligation to Native Americans, the agencies caved in."

BLM justified approval of the project because of increased state and national emphasis on renewable energy, and added further mitigation measures to the project. However, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation reaffirmed that the potential 48-megawatt output of the project was not worth the cost, stating unequivocally that "the proposed site for the Telephone Flat project is wrong; the costs to the historic resources of Native Americans and our nation are too high." (emphasis added). Project opponents steadfastly insist that the so-called additional mitigation measures are merely a token concession. "The bottom line is that impacts are still adverse and cannot be mitigated," said Berditschevsky.

"If anything, there is less need for the project now that the California 'energy crisis' has been exposed for being the price manipulation that it was," said Peggy Risch of the Mount Shasta Bioregional Ecology Center. "Now the agencies are using California's mandate to develop renewables as a reason to reverse the decision. Yet energy from this project has been committed to Bonneville Power Administration, which sells most of its power in Washington, Oregon and Idaho and would only return power to California (at out-of-state prices) in the unlikely event of a surplus," said Risch.

The project would be situated in the heart of the Medicine Lake Caldera, an area sacred to the Pit River, Klamath-Modoc, Shasta, and Wintu Tribes. A coalition of Tribes opposing the project since 1996 successfully petitioned the National Register of Historic Places to designate the 24-square mile site as a Native American Traditional Cultural District in 1999 so they could continue to use the area for healing and renewal and as a training ground for traditional medicine practitioners. Studies show that geothermal development poses severe risks to water resources-in this case the pure underlying aquifer that emerges as the state's largest spring system and feeds into the Sacramento River. Leases associated with the project cover 8 square miles, beginning within 500 yards of Medicine Lake and encompassing several other pristine lakes and springs. The 9-story high plant complex would annually produce 18 tons of toxic hydrogen sulfide gas, and other heavy metals such as arsenic and mercury, descending through large visible steam plumes. Initial drilling calls for 10 to 12 wells to depths of 9,000 feet, with additional wells throughout the life of the project. 24-hour lighting and noise would disturb this peaceful remote area where nothing dims the star-paved night sky. "Such industrial intrusion in a timeless landscape cannot be considered 'green energy production'," said Risch.

Opponents insist that the project's impacts required denial, a position supported by the top federal and state historic preservation agencies, as well as California Senator Barbara Boxer, New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone, and a multitude of environmental and Native American groups including the prestigious National Congress of American Indians and International Indian Treaty Council.

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