Executive Summary

The South Texas Sand Sheet is a unique wetland complex extending from the southern shore of Baffin Bay into Willacy County and has been accurately described as the “Last Great Habitat” (Ceasar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute, Texas A&M University-Kingsville, 2002). This distinction is based on several facts:

1. Many of the indigenous plants and animals are found nowhere else in the U.S.
2. The five lower coastal counties have 87 threatened and endangered species of plants and animals
3. Area includes extensive isolated coastal wetland breeding grounds for countless species
4. The Laguna Madre is the only remaining hypersaline lagoon in the U.S. and one of only six in the world

The two wind energy development facilities proposed for Kenedy County will have a catastrophic impact on the hydrology of this biologically valuable wetland system and, more importantly, on the Laguna Madre. This would be an ecological and biological disaster. This conclusion is based upon the disruption of the sheet flow of water through the sands that lie immediately beneath the land surface of this region of the Texas Coast by the extensive road construction. The construction and continued use of the road system by heavy vehicles will cause the compaction and compression of the subsurface, interfering with and ultimately blocking transmission through the sands to the Laguna Madre. Additionally, such obstructions will lead to the impoundment of salt water from hurricane surge tide events such as that which occurred with Hurricane Brett in 1999. However, with Brett, the surge tide quickly drained back to the Laguna Madre. With the road system in place, tides such as those with Brett will be trapped and kept behind the artificial barriers, leading ultimately to the destruction of the freshwater ecology of the prairie/wetland complex where the wind farms will be located.

The work completed to date by PPM and Babcock & Brown (the two companies pursuing the construction of two separate industrial wind energy facilities) on the Gulf Wind site puts in place the first of several impedances to the flow of water through the sand sheet. Although the scale of this disruption is relatively localized to date, if this construction continues, these impacts will extend to encompass roughly 35,000 acres and will certainly transform the existing prairie/wetland complex and the Laguna Madre causing extensive irreparable harm.

Full Report: Biogeochemical Analysis with the Wind Development Projects in Kenedy County by Dr. Ronald Sass

A Brief Inquiry into the Ecohydrology of the South Texas Sand Sheet by Dr. John S. Jacob

Letter from Larry Dunbar, P.E.

A Report to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT)
WIND GENERATION ASSESSMENT (PDF file)
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Proposed Penescal Point Wind Field
Kenedy County, Texas (Microsoft Power Point file)
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