Although the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released Aug. 30 the Final Environmental Impact Study (FEIS) for California’s ambitious Ivanpah Commercial Solar Power Project, also known as the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System (ISEGS), the protest period is long from over.

ISEGS’s proposed plan is to utilize seven “power towers” that are 459ft. tall and filled with water which are heated by a series of heliostats placed in concentric circles around the towers. The heated water then turns to steam driving a turbine within the tower and generating what BrightSource hopes to be near 400MW, or enough energy to power approximately 320,000 homes.

The 4,245 acres ISEGS plans to occupy will all be on public lands, creating quite a debate as to the environmental impact the gargantuan power plant would have on the California desert.

There are some in direct opposition to the plant for the reduction in recreational areas while many die hard environmentalists are up in arms claiming that the project will damage delicate ecosystems of desert plants, and specifically have an extremely negative impact on the California desert tortoise. The impact study for ISEGS, available on the BLM website, confirms some of the environmentalists’ concerns.

“Many sensitive species have the potential to occur within the project site and within the region,” states the report. “These species are monitored due to concerns about population viability and as useful indicators of ecosystem health.”

Although the FEIS suggests that some vulnerable plant and animal species may be negatively affected by the ISEGS project, the overall impact is stated clearly in the final summary of the report, “The proposed site location for the ISEGS project meets the Multiple Use Class Guidelines (as applicable to the particular project/alternatives/site locations) as noted in the [California Desert Conservation Area] CDCA Plan.”