[Federal Register Volume 86, Number 157 (Wednesday, August 18, 2021)]
[Notices]
[Pages 46236-46237]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2021-17700]


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DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

[Project No. 3442-029]


City of Nashua, New Hampshire; Notice of Application Tendered for 
Filing With the Commission and Soliciting Additional Study Requests and 
Establishing Procedural Schedule for Relicensing and a Deadline for 
Submission of Final Amendments

    Take notice that the following hydroelectric application has been 
filed with the Commission and is available for public inspection.
    a. Type of Application: Subsequent License.
    b. Project No.: 3442-029.
    c. Date Filed: July 30, 2021.
    d. Applicant: City of Nashua (the City).
    e. Name of Project: Mine Falls Hydroelectric Project.
    f. Location: The existing project is located on the Nashua River in 
Hillsborough County, New Hampshire. The project does not affect federal 
lands.
    g. Filed Pursuant to: Federal Power Act 16 U.S.C. 791(a)-825(r).
    h. Applicant Contact: James W. Donchess, Mayor, City of Nashua, 229 
Main Street, P.O. Box 2019, Nashua, NH 03060; Telephone (603) 589-3260.
    i. FERC Contact: Khatoon Melick, (202) 502-8433 or 
[email protected].
    j. Cooperating agencies: Federal, state, local, and tribal agencies 
with jurisdiction and/or special expertise with respect to 
environmental issues that wish to cooperate in the preparation of the 
environmental document should follow the instructions for filing such 
requests described in item l below. Cooperating agencies should note 
the Commission's policy that agencies that cooperate in the preparation 
of the environmental document cannot also intervene. See, 94 FERC ] 
61,076 (2001).
    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: September 28, 2021. The Commission strongly 
encourages electronic filing. Please file additional study requests and 
requests for cooperating agency status using the Commission's eFiling 
system at https://ferconline.ferc.gov/FERCOnline.aspx. For assistance, 
please contact FERC Online Support at [email protected], (866) 
208-3676 (toll free), or (202) 502-8659 (TTY). In lieu of electronic 
filing, you may submit a paper copy. Submissions sent via the U.S. 
Postal Service must be addressed to: Kimberly D. Bose, Secretary, 
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, 888 First Street NE, Room 1A, 
Washington, DC 20426. Submissions sent via any other carrier must be 
addressed to: Kimberly D. Bose, Secretary, Federal Energy Regulatory 
Commission, 12225 Wilkins Avenue, Rockville, Maryland 20852. All 
filings must clearly identify the project name and docket number on the 
first page: Mine Falls Hydroelectric Project (P-3442-029).
    m. The application is not ready for environmental analysis at this 
time.
    n. Project Description: The existing Mine Falls Project consists 
of: (1) A 242-acre impoundment with a normal storage volume of 1,970 
acre-feet and a normal headpond elevation of 158.76 ft (NAVD 88); (2) a 
rock filled concrete cap, variable in height dam with an approximately 
132-foot-long spillway at a permanent crest elevation of 154.66 feet, 
and nominal 4.0-foot-high wooden flashboards maintaining a normal 
headpond elevation of 158.76 feet; (3) a 22-foot-wide and 170-foot-long 
reinforced concrete power canal located between the right bank of the 
Nashua river and the single flood sluice gate; (4) two 12.5-foot-long 
wooden stoplog bays located immediately upstream of the intake to the 
right of the concrete capped spillway (viewed facing downstream) with a 
10-foot-wide gate and a short spillway section above the gate; (5) a 
40-foot-wide, 20-foot-high intake structure with steel trashrack with 
two square-to-round transition openings that feed the two penstocks 
that terminate at the two turbines; (6) two 64-foot-long, 104-inch-
diameter steel penstocks between the intake and turbine units; (7) a 
44-foot-long, 44-foot-wide multi-level reinforced concrete powerhouse 
containing two 1,500 kilowatt turbine-generator units; (8) an 
approximately 22-foot-wide, 1,100-foot-long tailrace that is a channel 
cut into the Nashua river bedrock downstream of the powerhouse that 
returns water back into the Nashua river; (9) a 278-foot-long bypass 
reach extending from the spillway crest and stoplog bays to the 
downstream of the powerhouse at the tailrace, bypassing 20 cubic feet 
per second (cfs) of water for environmental flows; (10) an upstream 
fish passage; (11) a 610-foot-long, 34.5-kilovolt underground 
transmission line connects the generator transformer to the 
interconnect point; and (12) appurtenant facilities. The estimated 
gross head of the project is 38 feet. The powerplant has a maximum 
nameplate capacity of 3 MW. The project generates an annual average of 
12,563 megawatt-hours.
    The City proposes to continue to operate the project in a run-of-
river mode with no storage or flood control capacity. The project 
operates within a flow range of 180 cfs (150 cfs minimum hydraulic 
capacity to start a single

[[Page 46237]]

turbine, plus 20 cfs minimum bypass release at the dam and an 
additional 10 cfs flow routed through the Mill Pond gatehouse to the 
Mill Pond and canal) and 1,100 cfs (maximum hydraulic capacity of the 
plant--two turbines combined) or a river flow of 1,130 cfs. Any flow 
above the capacity of the turbines plus minimum bypass flow and Mill 
pond diversion is spilled over the dam spillway and through the 
overflow section of the flood sluice gate.
    o. In addition to publishing the full text of this notice in the 
Federal Register, the Commission provides all interested persons an 
opportunity to view and/or print the contents of this notice, as well 
as other documents in the proceeding (e.g., license application) via 
the internet through the Commission's Home Page (http://www.ferc.gov) 
using the ``eLibrary'' link. Enter the docket number excluding the last 
three digits in the docket number field to access the document (P-
3442). At this time, the Commission has suspended access to the 
Commission's Public Reference Room due to the proclamation declaring a 
National Emergency concerning the Novel Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) 
issued by the President on March 13, 2020. For assistance, contact FERC 
at [email protected] or call toll-free, (866) 208-3676 or 
(202) 502-8659 (TTY).
    You may also register online at https://ferconline.ferc.gov/FERCOnline.aspx to be notified via email of new filings and issuances 
related to this or other pending projects. For assistance, contact FERC 
Online Support.
    p. Procedural Schedule: The application will be processed according 
to the following preliminary Hydro Licensing Schedule. Revisions to the 
schedule may be made as appropriate.

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                 Milestone                           Target date
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Issue Deficiency Letter...................  September 2021.
Request Additional Information............  September 2021.
Issue Notice of Acceptance................  January 2022.
Issue Scoping Document 1 for Comments.....  January 2022.
Comments on Scoping Document 1 Due........  March 2022.
Issue Scoping Document 2..................  April 2022.
Issue Notice of Ready for Environmental     April 2022.
 Analysis.
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    q. Final amendments to the application must be filed with the 
Commission no later than 30 days from the issuance date of the notice 
of ready for environmental analysis.

    Dated: August 12, 2021.
Kimberly D. Bose,
Secretary.
[FR Doc. 2021-17700 Filed 8-17-21; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6717-01-P