DOE’s Western Area Power Administration issued a Final EA that analyzed the potential environmental impacts of the proposed Willow Creek Wind Energy Facility in Butte County, South Dakota. The EA reviewed the potential environmental impacts of constructing, operating, and maintaining a 103-megawatt (MW) nameplate capacity wind power generating facility consisting of approximately 45 wind turbines, associated access roads, a new collector substation, an operations and maintenance facility, temporary staging areas, and associated transmission interconnection facilities. Western’s proposed action is to interconnect the facility with Western’s transmission system. Additional information is provided at https://www.wapa.gov/regions/UGP/Environment/Pages/willow-creek-wind.aspx.

This EA tiers from the Upper Great Plains Wind Energy Final Programmatic EIS (Western and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2015). The PEIS (DOE/EIS-0408) assesses environmental impacts associated with wind energy development and identifies best management practices to avoid and minimize those impacts.