Lazaro Aleman
ECB Publishing, Inc.
County officials may be meeting with representatives of the electric companies to see if the latter’s objections to the solar ordinance can be worked out before the measure goes to a public hearing.The ordinance, which was scheduled for a first public hearing by the Planning Commission on May 11, preparatory to going to the Jefferson County Commission for two more hearings before adoption, was pulled at the last minute because of concerns raised by two commissioners, based on complaints they had heard from citizens and a Duke Energy representative.
County Manager Shannon Metter informed the commission on Friday, May 26, that she had since met with representatives of Duke Energy to get their feedback on the ordinance and that she next planned to meet with NextEra representatives.
“We will then put the key points together
and set up a workshop with you guys and the electric companies,” Metty said. “That way, you guys can ask questions and we can get a better idea of what it is that the electric companies do, how they recycle the stuff, how they decommission the solar panels, how they normally prepare a site, and we’ll go from there.”
The commissioners welcomed the suggestion, saying that they looked forward to the interchange with the electric companies and the opportunity to ask questions of the latter's representatives.
The ordinance under consideration is a revision of an earlier one, the changes brought about because of changes in state law. Whereas previously large-scale solar facilities were permitted in agricultural land only by special exception, state law now allows them in all agricultural land by right. And while local governments can regulate aspects of the facilities, these areas are largely limited to buffers and setbacks.
The state law, however, is silent on the issue of stormwater, appearing to leave it by default to local governments to decide if, and how, they want to regulate runoff to prevent channelization and erosion.
This, at least, is how local officials interpret the state law, to the degree that they had two engineers draw up stormwater requirements for solar facilities in Jefferson County, rules that may be unique and groundbreaking.
And here is where the problem arises, with at least two commissioners questioning if the stormwater regulations don’t go overboard, in terms of violating property rights and setting the county up for another lawsuit (the county is currently being sued by a solar energy applicant whose project was denied).
The two commissioners who raised concerns about the ordinance were J. T. Surles and Stephen Walker.
Surles’ concerns, in fact, echoed Walker’s earlier expressed ones and stemmed from worries expressed to him by farmers and a Duke Energy representative. Per Surles, cattlemen, row crop farmers and timber people had approached him and said that the stormwater regulations stood to set a precedent that could prove detrimental to them.
Surles quoted a row-crop farmer whom he said wasn’t so much concerned about solar farms as he was about government overreach.
“He said to me, when I plow my field, it’s way more subject to erosion than what a solar panel will ever do,” Surles said. “He said, ‘I’m not worried about solar or anything; I’m more worried about the next run of commissioners that will ride this property rights’ issue and say, they did it on solar panels, let’s do it to row-crop farmers.’ He’s thinking down the road and I get it. Timber guys are thinking it too.”
A Duke Energy representative, he said, had also warned that the electric company would fight the county tooth and nail if it tried to impose what it deemed to be ridiculous erosion regulations, he said.
“I need some real guidance from the engineer and counsel that we are going to be able to ride this thing if it comes to a lawsuit, because it totally goes against state-mandated thing,” Surles said. “It’s totally in left field, is what they are saying.”
Walker was the first to decry certain aspects of the stormwater regulations as excessive and infringing on property rights. He didn’t believe that some of the measures were warranted, he said.
After Surles raised similar concerns, the board decided to pull the ordinance and revisit some of the proposed regulations.
Engineer Jack Husband, who largely drafted the stormwater regulations, has said that it was never the intent to harm farmers, but rather to preserve the county’s rural character.
He has argued that in light of the state’s silence on the issue, it’s incumbent on local governments to put measures in place to control runoff and prevent channelization.
“I worry that absent local regulations, there is going to be flooding downstream,” Husband has said.