Solar Energy growing rapidly across the state: What you need to know

LIMA

Utility-scale solar power is a rapidly growing endeavor for Ohio property owners.

According to Ohio Power Siting Board Public Information Office Matthew Butler, the board approved or reviewed 50 solar projects that are 50 megawatts or greater in the state of Ohio since 2018, with the vast majority of them being brought or proposed for areas in the western part of the state.

“Within the last four years, utility-scale solar has really taken off in Ohio,” Butler said. “At the power siting board, we have a map that shows all the projects across the state that we’ve either reviewed or have in our process currently. And there are about 50 projects that, again since 2018, have either become operational, have been approved by the power siting board or have entered our review process.”

The Ohio Power Siting Board, which reviews projects that are 50 megawatts or greater and cover hundreds to thousands of acres, including the recently denied Birch Solar Farm on the Allen/Auglaize county line, has eight criteria with which it judges solar energy projects as suitable to be reviewed.

The criteria call for the board to find and determine a need for a facility; probable environmental impact; compliance with Ohio Revised Code; consistency with regional plans for expansion of the power grid; a minimal adverse environmental impact; service to the public interest; convenience and necessity; impact on the viability as agricultural land; and incorporation of maximum feasible water conservation practices.

So far, there are five solar panel farms that have been approved by the siting board in Allen, Auglaize, Hardin, Putnam and Van Wert counties, and that is just a fraction of the projects that are being planned or have now been approved west of Columbus.

When taking into account what is needed for a solar farm and how in-demand land is, it is easy to see why landowners like Paul Neff, the farmer who owns the property where the Birch Solar Farm in Shawnee Township would be installed, are interested in leasing their land to enterprises like this.

Solar developers typically have three things they’re looking for in Ohio, Butler said:

• “Availability of transmission — so that means the project needs to be near an existing substation where they can tie into the regional electric grid,” he said.

• “They generally want flat ground because, for obvious reasons, that’s easier to develop than hilly ground for a project that’s covering a lot of acreage.”

• “And then they need willing landowners, so they need someone or a group of people willing to lease or sell their property to the project.”

That’s driven many projects to this side of Ohio.

“And while we do have a few projects in the eastern part of the state and more hilly areas, again, I mean 95% of it’s in the western half of the state,” Butler said.

The amount of flat farmland that Ohio has to offer draws clients from all over the world.

“There probably is a handful of developers developing these projects across the state,” Butler said. “And I’m not well-versed on their corporate structure or anything like that when they come to us, but they have an LLC that they formed for that specific project, and that’s the applicants that we deal with. But a lot of these are multi-national, international companies that are developing projects across the country and in some cases across the globe.”

Following the siting board’s decision on Thursday not to approve the solar panel farm, citing a lack of service to the public interest, convenience and necessity, Neff expressed his displeasure in a statement through the Allen Auglaize Coalition for Reasonable Energy, saying that the project would have “assured a steady stream of income from my family’s land, allowing us to compensate for the variability of commodity prices and nature.”

While the Ohio Power Siting Board holds a resource-neutral stance, meaning it does not favor one form of energy over another, the U.S. Department of Energy says that the amount of sunlight that hits the earth’s surface in an hour and a half is enough to power the entire world’s energy consumption for a full year.

The Birch Solar Farm, which called for a 300-megawatt farm covering 1400 acres, would have contributed approximately $81 million in additional revenue for the community over its project life, could improve soil health and create biodiverse wildlife habitats, as well as abate 423,700 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions, according to Lightsource bp, which would have owned and operated it.

Heated opposition

But as much as advocates say solar panel farms would benefit their communities, some Allen and Auglaize County residents have held firm against the projects.

“Solar farms can be a useful energy source, but they should be placed in locations where the population density is relatively smaller than Allen and Auglaize County,” read a public comment from September 16 on the Public Utilities Commission website from Landon Neuman about Birch Solar Farm. “The size and proximity of this project is simply too large and too close to the dense populations of Allen and Auglaize County.”

“They are ugly,” read a comment from Bob Steinke on August 18. “They don’t take care of them. I’ve seen the ones in Wapak and I don’t want to see them from my backyard.”

Deborah Gronas, who said she lives less than half a mile from the proposed site of the farm, said in a comment from July that she opposed the project for a number of reasons, citing high population density, lack of ability to handle water run-off, the noise of construction, no local benefits from the power and limited sun exposure.

In another letter from July, Michele VanMeter warned against risking the reduction of property values and a threat to wildlife.

Most of these deterring arguments have even shown up in the latest proposal to make waves, a smaller project being planned for a 25-acre footprint in Bath Township that was recently discussed in a meeting on Wednesday night.

A setback for advocates

Multiple groups, however, also shared how the decision might adversely affect them.

“It’s hard for us to understand how the Siting Board can view these benefits as not being in the public interest,” read a statement from Mike Ruppert on behalf of IBEW Local 32, an electrical workers union. “Birch Solar represents a pathway into the electrical trades where workers can finish their career with a pension that provides a respectable retirement, including healthcare.”

Several members of the Allen Auglaize Colation for Reasonable Energy cited the loss of tax revenue, damage to the environment and intrusion of big government as reasons for their disappointment in the decision.

“The Birch Solar farm would be something we can do locally to address threats to our health, our climate, our planet, and our environment as a whole,” read a quote from member of the coalition and nurse practitioner Rae Neal. “With the loss of the project, we also lose the potential benefits of perennial, native species, that would improve soil health, water filtration, and boost the biodiversity of surrounding residential and farm lands (sic).”

In a statement, Vice President of Development for Lightsource bp Shanelle Montana cited the lengths the project went to respond to the community’s complaints with ideas like a farm-style fence, recycling of end-of-life solar panels and continuing agricultural production with sheep grazing on the property.

While the power siting board cannot comment on the benefits or drawbacks of solar panel farms, Butler said that he is familiar with the issues that come into play from both sides, for and against the projects, as the siting board is responsible for examining these claims and judging whether they are suitable enough for projects to be approved.

“We’re looking at all the potential impacts so everything from ecological impacts to aesthetic impacts to socio-economic impacts,” Butler said. “And then all of that information is submitted by the applicant. Our staff conducts an investigation and makes recommendations to the board. And we have several ways that local governments and members of the public can participate in the process and provide their input and that input is taken into account both by the staff and then ultimately by the board before it makes its decision.”

Which Way, Western Ohio?

In its decision, the Ohio Power Siting Board said that it found that the farm satisfied all of the statutory requirements except service to public interest, convenience and necessity.

The board said that initially, it described environmental concerns and public opposition and that despite the concessions and communication efforts that Birch Solar made, that public opposition remained. Even then, the board recommended that the project went through the review process, subject to its ruling.

Lightsource bp developed an entire website for the farm to address issues and concerns that residents were raising. Visitors to birchsolarfarm.com were shown that 400 local jobs would have been created during construction, that setbacks and vegetative screening would have been installed to shield the farm from residents’ views and that the farm would remain in farm production with sheep grazing and panels confined only to parts of the land that has been set back from wetlands and already plowed.

With the Biden Administration’s pledge to decarbonize the power sector of the United States by 2035 and the economy by 2050, the Department of Energy announced $10 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to go to jump-starting solar energy careers in underserved communities and $56 million to go toward funding more solar manufacturing in July.

While the federal government announced this, Lightsource bp and its partners say they would invest an estimated $337 million of private capital into the Birch Solar Farm.

Even now that the project has been rejected by the siting board, Montana, on behalf of Lightsource bp, said that Birch Solar “will be exercising all options to move the project forward.”

And with the amount of time that was spent on the decision on Birch Solar Farm — about two years — and the amount of time it could take for a project like the one proposed in Bath Township — about a year — it is clear that both proponents and opponents of solar farms in their backyard will still have a heavy fight on their hands, even with the passing of Senate Bill 52, which forces large projects to go through more committee approvals.

After all, the flat farmlands of Western Ohio are not going anywhere soon.

Reach Jacob at 567-242-0399