[Federal Register Volume 69, Number 24 (Thursday, February 5, 2004)]
[Notices]
[Pages 5536-5537]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: E4-191]


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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

[Project No. 12451-001]


SAF Hydroelectric, LLC; Notice of Application Tendered for Filing 
With the Commission, Soliciting Additional Study Requests, and 
Establishing Procedures for Licensing and a Deadline for Submission of 
Final Amendments

January 29, 2004.
    Take notice that the following hydroelectric application has been 
filed with the Commission and is available for public inspection.
    a. Type of Application: Original major license.
    b. Project No.: 12451-001.
    c. Date Filed: January 20, 2004.
    d. Applicant: SAF Hydroelectric, LLC.
    e. Name of Project: Lower St. Anthony Falls Hydroelectric Project.
    f. Location: On the Mississippi River, in the Town of Minneapolis, 
Hennepin County, Minnesota. The project affects Federal lands.
    g. Filed Pursuant to: Federal Power Act 16 U.S.C. 791(a)-825(r).
    h. Applicant Contact: Douglas A. Spaulding, P.E., Spaulding 
Consultants, 1433 Utica Avenue South, Suite 162, Minneapolis, MN 55416, 
(952) 544-8133 or Robert Larson, 33 South 6th Street, Minneapolis, MN 
55402, (612) 343-2913.
    i. FERC Contact: Kim Carter at (202) 502-6486, or 
[email protected].
    j. Cooperating Agencies: We are asking Federal, State, local, and 
tribal agencies with jurisdiction and/or special expertise with respect 
to environmental issues to cooperate with us in the preparation of the 
environmental document. Agencies who would like to request cooperating 
status should follow the instructions for filing comments described in 
item (l) below.
    k. Pursuant to section 4.32(b)(7) of 18 CFR of the Commission's 
regulations, if any resource agency, Indian tribe, or person believes 
that an additional scientific study should be conducted in order to 
form an adequate factual basis for a complete analysis of the 
application on its merit, the resource agency, Indian tribe, or person 
must file a request for a study with the Commission not later than 60 
days from the date of filing of the application, and serve a copy of 
the request on the applicant.
    l. Deadline for Filing Additional Study Requests and Requests for 
Cooperating Agency Status: March 22, 2004.
    All documents (original and eight copies) should be filed with: 
Magalie R. Salas, Secretary, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, 888 
First Street, NE., Washington, DC 20426. The Commission's rules of 
practice require all interveners filing documents with the Commission 
to serve a copy of that document on each person on the official service 
list for the project. Further, if an intervener files comments or 
documents with the Commission relating to the merits of an issue that 
may affect the responsibilities of a particular resource agency, they 
must also serve a copy of the document on that resource agency.
    Additional study requests may be filed electronically via the 
Internet in lieu of paper. The Commission strongly encourages 
electronic filing. See 18 CFR 385.2001(a)(1)(iii) and the instructions 
on the Commission's Web site (http://www.ferc.gov) under the ``e-
Filing'' link. After logging into the e-Filing system, select ``Comment 
on Filing'' from the Filing Type Selection screen and continue with the 
filing process.
    m. Status: This application is not ready for environmental analysis 
at this time.
    n. Description of Project: The proposed Lower St. Anthony Falls 
Hydroelectric Project would be located at the U.S. Army Corps of 
Engineers (Corps) Lower St. Anthony Falls Lock and Dam and would 
utilize 5.9 acres of Corps lands. The generation turbines would be 
located in an auxiliary lock chamber adjacent to the Corp's main lock 
chamber. An auxiliary building, storage yard, and buried transmission 
line would occupy additional Corps lands. The project would operate in 
a run-of-river mode, according to the Corp's operating criteria which 
maintains a constant water surface elevation of 750.0 m.s.l. in the 
33.5-acre reservoir.
    The proposed project would consist of the following features: (1) 
16 turbine/generator units grouped in eight steel modules 6.2-foot-wide 
by 12.76 feet high having a total installed capacity of 8,980 
kilowatts, each module contains 2 turbine/generator sets (two 
horizontal rows of 1 unit each) installed in eight stoplog slots on the 
auxiliary lock structure; (2) a 1,050-foot-long, 13,800-volt buried 
transmission line; (3) a 21-foot by 81-foot control building to house 
switchgear and controls; (4) a 20-foot by 30-foot project office and 
storage building; and (5) appurtenant facilities.
    The applicant estimates that the average annual generation would be 
about 57,434,000 kilowatt-hours.
    o. A copy of the application is available for review at the 
Commission in the Public Reference Room or may be viewed on the 
Commission's Web site at http://www.ferc.gov using the ``eLibrary'' 
link. Enter the docket number, excluding the last three digits in the 
docket number field (P-12451), to access the document. For assistance, 
contact FERC Online Support at [email protected], or toll-free 
at 1-866-208-3676, or for TTY, (202) 502-8659. A copy is also available 
for inspection and reproduction at the address in paragraph (h) above.
    p. You may also register online at http://www.ferc.gov/esubscribenow.htm to be notified via e-mail of new filings and 
issuances related to this or other pending projects. For assistance, 
contact FERC Online Support.
    q. With this notice, we are initiating consultation with the 
Minnesota State Historic Preservation Officer (SHPO), as required by 
Sec. 106, National Historic Preservation Act, and the regulations of 
the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, 36 CFR 800.4.
    r. Procedural Schedule and Final Amendments: The application will 
be

[[Page 5537]]

processed according to the following Hydro Licensing Schedule. 
Revisions to the schedule will be made if the Commission determines it 
necessary to do so:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
                Action                           Tentative date
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Issue Deficiency Letter...............  March 2004.
Issue Acceptance letter...............  March 2004.
Issue Scoping Document 1 for comments.  May 2004.
Request Additional Information........  March 2004.
Notice of application is ready for      January 2005.
 environmental analysis.
Notice of the availability of the EA..  May 2005.
Ready for Commission's decision on the  July 2005.
 application.
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    Unless substantial comments are received in response to the EA, 
staff intends to prepare a single EA in this case. If substantial 
comments are received in response to the EA, a final EA will be 
prepared with the following modifications to the schedule.

Notice of the availability of the final EA: July 2005.
Ready for Commission's decision on the application: September 2005.

    Final amendments to the application must be filed with the 
Commission no later than 30 days from the issuance date of this notice.

Magalie R. Salas,
Secretary.
 [FR Doc. E4-191 Filed 2-4-04; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6717-01-P