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CIR Electrical Construction Corp. workers install an array of solar panels in Marilla in 2014. The panels move on a "tracker" system that automatically follows the sun to optimize the system's performance. Solar Cost For Home
Dan Handy is retired from dairy farming, drives a school bus and just finished a seven-year stint on the Marilla Planning Board.
The lifelong town resident is also in the middle of a controversy over solar arrays in the rural municipality of 5,100, where there have been two moratoriums placed on solar projects.
Renewable Properties, a California renewable energy firm, leases about 24 acres of land Handy owns on Bullis Road for a solar array. The company has applied for two more similar solar projects, one on Two Rod Road and another on a parcel he owns on Stolle Road.
Town officials have been concerned that solar arrays are being erected on valuable farmland. The Town Board on Thursday unanimously approved a new law governing solar energy systems.
The two proposed projects can go forward – they were grandfathered in under the old law because they were already proposed – but need to abide by more requirements for approval, town Supervisor Earl “Skip” Gingerich said.
They would not be allowed under the new law, Gingerich added.
“We didn’t realize what the impact was until one of them went in,” he said. “The two biggest areas we identified are visual and impact on viable agricultural land.”
Now in his mid-70s and thinking about retirement, Handy looks forward to annual payments from solar projects on his property.
A farm in Bavaria is covering its hops with solar panels, providing electricity to 250 households and shading the plants from the increasingly scorching summer heat in the process.
“It’s a whole lot more profitable for me than trying to rent it out to a farmer,” he said of solar lease rates to farmers at about $60 to $70 an acre. “It’s a nice little retirement plan for me.”
One man’s retirement plan has caused some misgivings in Marilla.
The town now requires a full environmental impact statement – a more comprehensive environmental review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act – for the two new applications.
“It came as a bit of surprise to us,” said Anthony Bell, senior permitting manager for Renewable Properties. He said such a lengthy environmental review was a first for the company.
The Stolle Road solar project includes the installation of about a 5-megawatt solar facility with underground utilities and access roads on about 38 acres of land. The Two Rod Road project would generate about the same power on 24.6 acres.
Handy’s Bullis Road project benefits the town through a payment in lieu of taxes agreement that averages $25,944 a year and a one-time lump sum payment of $100,000. Residents also have the option to apply for reduced electricity costs.
“The towns are free to do whatever they wish with those monies,” Bell said.
“If I was all about money, I would take the money and run,” Gingerich said. “I’m worried about the next generation being able to continue. If you don’t have strong agriculture, you’re not going to have a strong economy.”
Handy said the solar projects, with a life span of 25 to 30 years, do so.
“At the end of it, they have to put that ground back the exact same way they found it,” he said. “It’s actually preserving farmland.”
The new law sets up a solar overlay district in the southeast section of town that is the only area where solar projects will be allowed. It also requires a minimum setback of 400 feet from any public road, 1,000 feet from an occupied residence and 500 feet from property lines bordering any school, public park “or other public place that may be adversely impacted by the solar energy system.”
“I think they went too far,” Handy said. “It restricts property owners.”
Regardless of how people feel about the state’s goals to have more energy come from renewable sources, older power plants are going offline, Bell said, and “the new generation needs to take that place to keep electricity flowing through the grid.”
“Solar’s a very passive use,” he said. “It doesn’t need increased services.”
Renewable Properties also has built two community solar arrays in Lockport, and two in Batavia.
“This is a great benefit to the landowners, folks who are able to collect these rents,” Bell said.
Gingerich sees it differently. He thinks renewable energy companies are taking advantage of rural communities.
“If these solar panels were going in on open spots or down the median of thruways,” he said, “there’d be an uproar in the urban areas.”
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CIR Electrical Construction Corp. workers install an array of solar panels in Marilla in 2014. The panels move on a "tracker" system that automatically follows the sun to optimize the system's performance.
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