EN11 - Location and size of land owned, leased, managed in, or adjacent to, protected areas and areas of high biodiversity value outside protected areas

[This segment focuses primarily on land resources vs water resources, which are covered under EN 8, EN 9 and EN25. Areas such as the Noel Kempff and Guaraquecaba Projects are not included here, since they are not adjacent to company facilities. However, AEP properties bordering mitigation and protected wetlands are included.]

AEP owns or manages the land around its power generating and transmission facilities. System wide, AEP owns in fee, around 365,000 acres. This does not include mineral only (coal, CBM, oil and natural gas) ownership. This includes power plant sites, office buildings, substations, transmission and distribution lines, as well as coal fields yet to be mined, lands that have been mined, residential structures, river access and various other sites. Timber lands owned by AEP amount to over 156,000 acres and are currently under Forest Management. Not all of this land is used for timber production on a commercial basis but, instead, some is managed under the long-term sustained yield guidelines.

Land owned near the power plants directly supports the generation of electricity, serves as a buffer to these operations, and is often leased for agriculture. AEP operates electric transmission and distribution lines throughout its service territories in Arkansas, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, West Virginia, and Virginia. Many of these lands have no special designation, but some are protected and managed for their natural resource value.

Some of the company properties are located adjacent to protected areas or areas of high biodiversity value. Those areas that are designed, regulated or managed to achieve specific conservation objectives, or are recognized for important biodiversity features, are a priority for conservation, have been identified as areas of high biodiversity value. These areas, and the adjacent AEP properties, can be categorized into the following land uses:

Properties Bordering Wetland Mitigation Areas and Wildlife Enhancements
Wetlands are valuable ecological areas with unique biodiversity that must be protected. Mitigation wetlands have been established near many facilities to compensate for wetland losses due to construction.

The following coal-fired facilities, listed with their acreage, border mitigation wetlands:

• Amos (4515 acres)
• Conesville (19,830 acres)
• Gavin (7750 acres adjacent to the wetlands area)
• Mountaineer (2135 acres)
• Pirkey (approximately 15 adjacent acres)

The following hydroelectric projects border mitigation wetlands:

• Twin Branch (7 wetland acres near 817 project acres)
• Elkhart (1 wetland acre near 363 project acres)
• Byllesby/Buck (4.3 wetland acres near 288 project acres)
• Smith Mountain and Leesville (projects border shoreline wetlands -18 miles at Smith Mountain and 17 miles at Leesville)

Properties Bordering Important Biodiversity Features
Cook Nuclear Plant – Adjacent to the Lake Michigan Dunes Trail, which encompasses approximately 70 acres.

Clinch River Plant – The plant is in the near vicinity of the Cleveland Natural Area Preserve (~1,000 acres) that is home to unique habitat and rare plant and invertebrate species. Small fragments of these habitats are located on the Clinch River Plant property (30 acres).

Turk Plant – The plant site, which is under construction, is adjacent to the Nacatoch Ravines Natural Area in southwestern Arkansas. The Nacatoch Ravines Natural Area is one of the largest, and most intact, examples of dry, dry-mesic, and mesic upland forests remaining in the northern part of the West Gulf Coastal Plain of the state. Through much of the site, canopy trees average two to three feet or more in diameter, with many larger individual trees. Blackland prairie habitat and calcareous oak ravines are protected in the natural area. The Turk Plant site and its associated transmission lines are also within the range of the Ouachita Rock Pocketbook mussel, the Interior Least Tern, and the Louisiana Black Bear, all federally threatened and endangered species.

Properties In or Adjacent to National Forests and Parks
As mentioned earlier, AEP operates electric transmission and distribution (T&D) lines throughout its service territory in eleven different states. While many of the properties through which these lines cross have no special designation, some of them are protected for their ecological value. Among these are national forests maintained by the U.S. Forest Service.

Wyoming Jackson Ferry 765 kV Line - Crosses 11 linear miles of the Jefferson National Forest in Virginia.

Other Lines - In total, AEP maintains nearly 62 miles of transmission lines in the Jefferson and George Washington National Forests and special biological areas in Virginia and 0.3 miles in the West Virginia portion of the Jefferson National Forest. AEP also operates several T&D lines within the Wayne National Forest in Ohio, the Hoosier National Forest in Indiana, and the Daniel Boone National Forest in Kentucky.

[The new 765 kV line to New Jersey could potentially cross part of the Monogahela National Forest in West Virginia; a new line in Louisiana may also cross Forest Service land.]

Properties Bordering Habitat for Federal or State Endangered Species
Rockport Plant (4574 acres) – Plant property includes a one-acre area that supports the Maryland Meadowbeauty, a state endangered plant.

Riverside (505 acres) and Tulsa (85 acres) Power Stations – These facilities are adjacent to Interior least tern and bald eagle habitat along the Arkansas River.

Flint Creek Power Station property (1300 acres) – The property at this facility is commonly used as a wintering ground by bald eagles.

Claytor Hydroelectric Project - The bald eagle was removed from the list of threatened and endangered species in July 2007. The delisting was an indication of the species population growth and return to areas it had not been since its decline in the mid-20th century. As an indication of this success, eagles have built a nest in a tree on AEP’s Claytor Hydroelectric Plant property, prompting the state of Virginia and AEP to collaborate in developing an eagle habitat management plan. The plan’s purpose is to recognize where eagle activity is occurring on or near Claytor property and to manage activity in those areas to keep it at a level that can be tolerated by the eagles.

Arsenal Hill, Knox Lee, Lieberman, Pirkey, Welsh, Comanche, Northeastern, Riverside, Southwestern, Tulsa, Weleetka, and Flint Creek Power Stations – These properties (a total of nearly 20,000 acres) are located in counties that support federally endangered or threatened species, such as the Interior Least Tern, Red-cockaded Woodpecker, Piping Plover, Black-capped Vireo, Golden-cheeked warbler, Whooping cranes, Western Prairie Fringed Orchid, and the Arkansas River shiner. The endangered birds may frequent the habitats that surround these facilities.

Trent Mesa wind farm - AEP operates this wind farm in Texas, which supports important bird populations. Black capped vireos, a federally endangered species, are known to nest on the mesa’s slopes. Their routine nesting season activity occurs mainly within the scrubby vegetation characteristic of the region, well below the turbines. They spend the April through July time period in Texas and winter on the west coast of Mexico. The acreage of this facility is approximately 1,230 acres.

AEP 345 kV line between Lawton and Oklaunion, TX - This line is in the migratory flyway of the whooping crane and has been marked with aviation balls as a deterrent to bird collisions. Another 345 kV line runs 80 miles between the Lon Hill and Coleto Creek Power Stations, which is in the historic habitat of the Attwater’s prairie chicken. Bird diversion devices have also been added to this line. Both bird species are on the endangered species list.

Also see: Conservation & stewardship