Solar developers will pay a premium to build projects on prime farmland under new rules being worked on in Maine.
The state Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry is writing the rules based on a 2023 law that authorized it to charge additional fees to developers whose projects affect at least 5 acres of “high-value agricultural land,” which regulators will define. in current regulations. this summer.
The program could involve a series of new fees for different types of farmland and project impacts, with money set aside for “farmland conservation and solar mitigation projects.” Proponents hope the rules will push renewable energy development toward areas with less conservation value.
“We would rather see balanced solar siting than complete moratoriums on solar energy development,” said Shelley Megquier, director of policy and research for the Maine Farmland Trust, which supported the legislation authorizing the new rules.
Critics, however, say the rules unfairly single out solar energy based solely on anecdotal evidence of the industry’s impact on farmland. A recent report from the American Farmland Trust projected that low-density housing and other types of urban sprawl threaten to swallow up more than 53,000 acres, or 5% of all Maine farmland, by 2040.
The law also authorized the development of a similar scheme for wind and transmission projects that affect certain types of fish and wildlife habitat.
Limited data, local concerns
Some advocates say the new rates single out renewables without clear evidence that a use like solar puts prime agricultural land at greater risk than any other type of development.
“The narrative around this has really been: How can we protect high-value agricultural land from solar development?” said Lindsay Bourgoine, policy director for ReVision Energy, a major New England solar developer. “ReVision has serious concerns about the lack of data on that narrative.”
Maine’s climate plan includes a goal to move to 100% renewable electricity by 2040, and also aims to put 30% of the state’s lands in conservation easements, including those set aside for agriculture, by 2030.
The state has already built about a gigawatt of solar power, most of it in smaller-scale projects. The five-acre minimum covered by the new offset rates can support about one megawatt of solar energy.
Bourgoine’s company estimates that even if all of Maine’s existing solar projects under 5 megawatts had been on prime agricultural land, they would cover less than half a percent of all that land statewide. A recent report from the Center for Rural Affairs estimated a similar share of solar power in Midwestern states.
Groups that supported Maine’s new fee rules agreed that they hope state lawmakers and policymakers will focus in the near future on both collecting more data on land use and considering expanding mitigation tools to uses that may be more common, such as housing, commercial development or roads.
“If we’re talking about environmental impacts, we require mitigation of the only type of development that benefits the environment,” said conservation biologist and GIS manager Sarah Haggerty of Maine Audubon, who supported the bill to create the clean energy rate. programs.
Keeping farmers’ options open
In the absence of better data, Megquier said farmers and agricultural conservation groups like his can only go by what they see, which is “agricultural lands that are being converted for solar production in fairly large quantities,” he said.
“Some of that is what we would classify as very high value agricultural land, which unfortunately is being lost to agricultural production,” he said. “There may be farmers who are interested in accessing those lands to grow food for our communities.”
Andy Smith and his partner run The Milkhouse dairy farm in Monmouth, Maine. They have their own small solar panel and are located near an electrical substation, so they have attracted a lot of interest from solar developers who want to rent and build on part of their land. Some have offered more than $1,000 per acre on a 30-year lease, he said.
Smith said he strongly supports an energy transition and sees frequent effects of increasing climate extremes on his farm. But he said solar power is tough competition for farmers who rent or buy space from other property owners, often to grow hay to feed dairy cows like Smith’s.
“If young people try to buy agricultural land and compete with solar developers, they will not be able to buy agricultural land,” he said.
For farmers who affirmatively want solar power on their land, Megquier’s group hopes the new fee structure will incentivize projects to take place on “marginal” lands that are less productive, deforested or disconnected from large areas of active farming.
“We hope that … this rulemaking takes those kinds of complexities into account,” he said. “We would like to see permitting for solar development that supports current agricultural operations accelerated or otherwise accelerated.”
ReVision supports a similar result.
“We would simply say that a landowner should have the default ability to be able to install solar on their property if the purpose is to diversify income to keep the farm running,” Bourgoine said.
Evelyn Norton’s family built this solar panel on marginal soil on their Maine dairy farm; Now it is her biggest source of income. (Credit: ReVision Energy) Credit: ReVision Energy
‘It gives us security’
Evelyn Norton is one of those landowners. Her father raised dairy cows and harvested hay to feed them on his family’s farm in Livermore Falls, Maine. As that business declined and her father grew older, Norton said she realized, realistically, that she and her sister “were not going to be on tractors pulling hay… and then we realized we needed to figure out “What more could we do to bring income to the farm.”
Numerous solar developers had contacted the family about installing a panel on their land. Many looked towards a particularly flat area, without trees, close to the network infrastructure and with sandy soil. It had been the least productive hay plot on the farm, Norton said.
“Someone referred to it as a Walt Disney solar farm property,” Norton said. “It was like it was designed to be a solar panel.”
His family worked with ReVision to build a community solar array on those 20 acres, which cover about 15% of the farm’s total area. The grass beneath the panels is grazed by sheep, and the array provides power to five school districts, a nod to Evelyn’s mother, who was a longtime teacher.
Annual lease payments now form the farm’s largest source of income, supplemented by other agricultural uses such as tree growing and a farmer renting space for his livestock.
“We still want to remain a unit farm and not have to sell piece by piece. This allows us to do that,” Norton said. “It gives us the security of knowing that 135 acres are protected because of the 20 acres.”
Norton is concerned that the new rate structure, if not designed with proper exceptions, could prevent some farmers from using solar energy like she did to keep her farm viable.
Driving more expensive approaches
Some advocates said they hope the rules will primarily help balance the costs of solar development so that farmland isn’t automatically the cheapest option.
Smith, the Monmouth dairy farmer, said he hopes at least the new fees will encourage development on “lower quality soils.” But that’s easier said than done: These soils may have poorer drainage, for example, and contain areas classified as wetlands, leading to further regulatory complications.
“It often looks like a (good) solar site will be on well-drained soil with southern exposure, which is also the best cropland there is,” he said.
“We sincerely hope that this effort will not have a chilling effect… and, in some cases… can help solar companies in terms of predictability,” Megquier said. “The current structure is really not a structure. It’s very… project by project. And that does not benefit the advancement of our conservation goals, nor does it benefit the advancement of our renewable energy goals.”
Under the new rules, regulators will have to define “dual-use agricultural and solar production,” as solar energy projects where crops and solar energy are co-located. Megquier hopes the new rates will incentivize this approach.
For Smith, dual-use methods are the best hope for easing rural and neighborhood backlash toward solar energy, which he worries will slow its growth as a tool to fight climate change.
“It would be really horrible if the entire solar industry got a black eye because of the development of these open spaces,” he said.
Maine Audubon’s Haggerty said rising construction costs on farmland could make more expensive solar sites, including brownfields and developed spaces, more attractive to builders by comparison.
“It’s very possible that this legislation will balance out some of those costs, you know, if you’re going to have to mitigate… agricultural land or wildlife habitat, maybe make those brownfields more affordable and not be much cheaper to go to them.” in other places,” he stated. “That’s one of the things we hope to see.”
The state is currently gathering input from stakeholders on a draft farmland rule expected to be released this summer. The Maine legislature will have to approve the eventual rate structures, which will apply to solar panels that begin construction after September 1, 2024.
Related
[fifu]
Keynote USA
For the Latest Local News, Follow Keynote USA Local on Twitter.