Plans to place one large solar array near Annandale and others at about 20 additional sites around Minnesota received approval from the state last week.
The 100-megawatt, $250 million Aurora Solar Project was granted a site permit by the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission on Thursday, May 28, giving the green light to what will become the largest solar project in Minnesota.
That approval did not come without extensive discussion about the 70-acre, 6-MW Annandale site by PUC commissioners during a 2.5-hour deliberation, however.
At issue was a report from the Minnesota Department of Commerce that classified 24 sites identified by Geronimo Energy and Aurora Distributed Solar in three categories: those that required little mitigation work to reduce human and environmental impacts, those that required additional mitigation efforts and those that would be difficult to mitigate.
Annandale, along with four other locations, fell into the last category, with the report noting that the site located south of Minnesota Pioneer Park on Klever Avenue was in the city of Annandale’s planned growth area.
Since the city has invested in oversized infrastructure to accommodate future growth in the area, the report noted that putting a solar facility there "conflicts with the state goal of locating large electric power (facilities) in an orderly manner compatible with environmental preservation and efficient use of resources."
As a result, it appeared prior to the hearing that the Annandale site may have been taken off the table, but when commissioners sought to clarify whether that was the case during the hearing, Suzanne Steinhauer of the Minnesota Department of Commerce said the categories were simply meant to show the relative merits of the sites.
"We never said we recommended that they be excluded, but should the commission want to limit sites we believe the sites in that Category 3 area present the most challenges with balancing the desire to minimize human and environmental impacts with the desire for a 100 MW project," she said.
When pressed about whether she recommended any sites be excluded, Steinhauer said the Pipestone project should not be considered due to its proximity to a residential area. Of the remaining four, including Annandale, she said the human and environmental impacts must be weighed against the project’s benefits.
Administrative Law Judge Barbara Case presented an opinion on that matter in her report on April 9, saying that while the four Category 3 projects are located on land that has been identified as growth areas for cities, there is little evidence that development is imminent.
"Therefore, development of (solar) facilities on these sites is not clearly a land use conflict or a misuse of state resources," Case concluded.
Since the Aurora project has a 20-year contract to provide power to Xcel Energy and the sites can be decommissioned and converted to a different use relatively easily, PUC commissioners were inclined to agree that solar facilities are an appropriate use of the land in question until future development occurs.
"We believe that our timeline is appropriate for most of these cities given the rate of growth that they have," Nathan Franzen of Geronimo Energy told the commissioners. "We did a lot of homework in selecting our properties to make sure we weren’t the parcel … that would prevent future development. None of our properties do that."
In the end, commissioners approved 21 of the 24 requested sites, eliminating Pipestone, Zumbrota and Wyoming due to land use issues but including Annandale and Mayhew Lake from the five Category 3 sites. Aurora representatives and commissioners agreed that Annandale would prefer the project be placed elsewhere, but felt its specific concerns could be adequately addressed.
"I don’t think there are any serious issues there," concluded commissioner Dan Lipschultz, who made the motion to include Annandale in the site permit. "I’m not suggesting that Annandale is OK with building there, but it sounds like there are things the company can do that would address the chief concerns of the municipality."
Annandale concerns
With the question of appropriate land use within city growth areas addressed, commissioners turned to a number of written requests from the city of Annandale if the project were to be built within its growth area.
The city had primarily requested that the project be located outside its growth area, but if that were not possible that vegetative screening be installed, that financial assurances be in place to ensure future decommissioning, and that proper maintenence be done on the site.
"Vegetative screening was considered there, but the only surrounding land uses are agriculture," said Aurora Distributed Solar attorney Jeremy Duehr. "Our position has been that if there is something that needs to be screened at some point in time, we’re happy to do screening. At this time it doesn’t seem like it’s necessary to mitigate any real impacts. But I can understand (Annandale’s) concern. If development encroaches, you’d want it to be screened so development can encroach. We can do that."
Nearby property owner Chip Purcell had requested screening, but because his home is located beyond the 350-foot boundary that the company typically uses to determine if screening is needed, the company will not install screening at present.
As for the decommissioning and maintenance concerns, commissioners agreed that the decommissioning requirements were clearly delineated in the site permit language, and Duehr said the company has an interest in properly maintaining vegetation at the site to ensure full production.
Corinna’s concerns
PUC commissioners did not discuss written comments from Corinna Township, where the project will be located, during their deliberation.
In addition to the same concerns the city of Annandale had expressed, township officials had submitted a three-page letter with concerns about low property taxes generated by the site, visual impacts to neighboring land owners and potential impact to land values. Additional concerns were also voiced regarding a lack of local jurisdiction or control in the process, as well as the changing of the Annandale site from 2.5-MW to 6-MW with no direct communication of the change in size to the township.
The township had also requested more information on the impact of the project on its roads in terms of maintenance needed due to extra traffic during construction, and noted that a natural gas pipeline runs through the property being considered for the solar farm.
While there was no discussion on the township’s input, PUC chair Beverly Jones Heydinger said the board was doing its best to take local concerns into account.
"I’m trying hard to be fair to all concerned here. Because this is the first facility that we’re siting we’re particularly sensitive to having it go as smoothly with the local units of government as possible," she said. "Let’s try to get the first project off on the best possible foot."
Construction this fall
While obtaining the site permit was the largest remaining hurdle for the project to become a reality, there is still uncertainty about which sites will be used.
"We’re keeping our options open. Sometimes when you get into certain sites you might discover things that you didn’t know were there that won’t allow you to build on that site," said Betsy Engelking, vice president at Geronimo Energy, explaining that bedrock may make a site in Hastings unsuitable for construction. "I will say that we definitely won’t build all of the sites, but at this point we don’t know which of the sites aren’t going to be built. We’ll probably know that … about August."
A final step will be to submit final construction designs to the state, which will occur in August, and approval at that point will mean construction can begin.
"The plan is to start moving some dirt in September," said Engelking.
It is expected that various construction teams will rotate to the various sites – including an 8.5-MW location in Buffalo Township and a 2.5-MW site near Montrose – to build the facilities in phases. All facilities are expected to be online by the end of 2016.
The Annandale site could require grading on nearly 50 acres according to a preliminary construction design. As for the array itself, it will consist of solar panels roughly 6-by-3 feet in size that will rotate to follow the sun. The panels will be mounted on poles driven into the ground, most likely without a concrete base, so that the array can be removed relatively easily.
The tallest item on the site – which will include a seven-foot-tall security fence topped by one foot of barbed wire, an access road and electrical inverters – is expected to be about 10 feet tall.
"I think that solar is fairly new to people, and people tend to be concerned about things that are unknown," said Engelking. "From an energy standpoint, unlike other things, they have no noise, nothing that spins in the air, no emissions and they don’t use a lot of water. They will exist very quietly in the community, and I think people are going to be pleased with the result once the project is constructed."
■ See next week’s Advocate for additional coverage.
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