Article from:
February 1, 2024
A permit has not yet been granted, but a solar farm proposed on nearly 1,000 acres in Orange County is already facing pushback from neighbors.
BayWa r.e., the Irvine, California-based developer behind the 80 megawatt Sunfish Solar project east of
U.S. 522 near the border of Orange and Culpeper counties, is hopeful that engaging with the public face to face will smooth community relations and provide a space for an open dialogue. A public meeting was held Wednesday at the Historic Train Depot in the town of Orange and, to sweeten the pot, the company has donated more than $30,000 to local organizations.
For some locals, these efforts aren’t selfless acts of charity.
“It’s bribery in my book,” Orange County resident Lisa Mountjoy told The Daily Progress. “That’s all it is. They want to get their foot in the door and get solar panels on the land. Farmland and forested land are places they should never do.”
Sunfish Solar LLC donated $10,000 to Orange County High School’s Future Farmers of America club to sponsor its annual trip to Indianapolis; $5,000 to the Mine Run Volunteer Fire Department to support its smoke and carbon monoxide detector program; $11,677 to the local 4-H Dairy Club; and $3,550 to the Orange County Boy Scouts Troop 14.
The solar developer considers itself an agriculture-focused firm, which is why it has partnered with Future Farmers of America programs where it can in the areas where it has projects across the country, said BayWa r.e. senior director of land entitlement team Brandon Reinhardt. The Sunfish Solar outreach team met with local organizations in Orange County to find out what way the energy corporation could support the area, according to Reinhardt.
“We’re looking forward to finding synergy between our company and the community,” he told The Daily Progress. “This project is a boon to the local economy.”
Mountjoy, as well as others who reached out to The Daily Progress about the development, see the donations as means to garner positive coverage and buy local support. These renewable energy projects, even “community solar farms” which are smaller in scale, are facing protests from rural counties across the commonwealth and the country.
“These big companies come from California and they come up here and try to take over your towns with bribes. They tell you all this great stuff, but there’s absolutely nothing they can say that makes it all right to destroy 3,000 acres of farmland,” said Mountjoy.
Mountjoy purchased her 180-acre farm more than 30 years ago. The solar development, as proposed, will be constructed on a hilly 932-acre parcel adjacent to her property that is today dotted with pastures and forested fields. According to Mountjoy, Sunfish Solar purchased some of its acreage from her neighbors Todd and Lisa Harris.
The Daily Progress reached out to Todd Harris, but he was not available for comment.
Recently, Mountjoy held a “solar opposition” meeting that she said drew a crowd of roughly 100 people, who came together to express a variety of concerns regarding the solar development: the rural integrity of the farmland, hazardous waste escaping from broken panels, the harm to local wildlife, fires, noise pollution, the decommission process, neighbor’s property values.
“We would never have bought it if we knew this would have happened,” said Mountjoy. “It’s horrifying. They’re destroying that land permanently.”
The issues raised by Mountjoy and other community members join the chorus of opponents singing out across the nation as solar developers clash with residents in rural America. Despite the widely recognized need to expand renewable energy efforts to battle the climate crisis and the increasing affordability of solar power, many in rural areas, where utility-scale solar projects often wind up, are unwilling to compromise.
While complaints vary from community to community, a recurrent theme is that solar farms drive down the property values of their neighbors. However, research conducted by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in March 2023 found negligible dips in prices from the sales of 1.8 million homes near solar farms across six states.
Wednesday’s public meeting featured several speakers with the Sunfish Solar team as well as a variety of stations offering information on different aspects of the solar development.
“In our experience, most of the concerns have a lot of misinformation, so we have community meetings to make sure everyone is informed and get accurate information,” Reinhardt told The Daily Progress. “We have experts there to answer questions from the public and provide information that will make them excited about the project.”
Reinhardt emphasized several components of the project that could benefit the residents and economy of Orange County. The construction is expected to last roughly 12 to 18 months and create about 185 temporary jobs. Results drawn from an economic impact study the energy company assembled estimated that the project would generate slightly less than $8 million for the county due to construction. The predicted economic annual revenue for Orange while the solar project is operating is
$1.6 million, according to the study.
That potential income is still not enough to sway Mountjoy.
“There’s more, in my view, against it than for it. That’s just $8 million,” she said.
The Daily Progress reached out to Orange County planner Eric Bittner, who is charged with reviewing Sunfish Solar’s permit, with no response.
The Sunfish Solar development is projected to produce enough energy to power roughly 10,000 Orange County residents via a station off of the Oak Green-Mountain Run transmission line. If the permit is granted, construction on the solar panels should begin around fall 2025 and wrap around summer 2026.
Protect Orange VA site editors comment:
Hmmm ... a solar company that describes itself as an "agriculture-focused firm" and gives money to the Future Farmers of America -- oh, while also targeting agricultural land to turn that land into a power plant for decades??
Yes, the opposition meeting was very well attended and there were a lot of thoughtful questions and concerns expressed. The BayWa representative quoted in the article above belittled county residents with the comment about misinformation.
The journalist noted that "many in rural areas are unwilling to compromise" on the issue. Why should we compromise, when we know there are other more appropriate sites for this industrial project and the only reason the developers want the ag land is that it tends to be flat and cheap and will therefore save THEM money?
No one should ever refer to negative impact on someone else's property -- likely their biggest investment -- as "negligible."
In reference to the public meeting hosted by Baywa at the Depot, the company's senior director of land entitlement (!) Mr Reinhardt, is quoted: “We have experts there to answer questions from the public and provide information that will make them excited about the project.” We were at the meeting and found the team unable to answer many questions. Guess that's why we are not excited about the project.
Many, many journalists write sentences similar to this one pulled from the article above: "The Sunfish Solar development is projected to produce enough energy to power roughly 10,000 Orange County residents..." Such statements can mislead a reader into thinking the power is actually serving the citizens of the county. With utility scale projects, power goes into the grid, unlike with community solar, which supports businesses and property owners.
And journalists, please don't call them FARMS.