DNR halts state land leases for utility-scale solar projects
The policy change was made quietly earlier this month, without a public announcement. DNR spokesman Ed Golder said the agency made the policy change known via a May 9 email from DNR Director Scott Bowen to "a number of interested groups and to legislators who have contacted us" about a controversial proposal to lease 420 acres of state-managed forest land near Gaylord for a solar development in Otsego County's Hayes Township.
That project, which raised some public ire over the removal of acres of trees to make way for a private company's solar panels, was scuttled when the company involved, RWE Clean Energy out of San Diego, decided not to pursue additional development on the state land in Hayes Township. But the DNR in January proceeded to pursue a request for proposals to lease the land and evaluate its viability for solar, possibly with another company.
In his May 9 email, Bowen announced that the DNR "will not move forward" with utility-scale solar development on the 420 acres in Hayes Township.
"The DNR made this decision following a four-month public comment period, and consultation with legislators and interested groups," Bowen stated. "We heard a significant amount of concern from the public, stakeholders and some lawmakers regarding the prospect of siting solar panels on 420 acres of partially forested land."
Bowen added that DNR "will maintain a pause on any new utility-scale solar projects on state forestlands" until the agency develops "a specific framework for decision making if leasing lands for additional solar development were to be considered in the future."
"As part of this framework, the DNR will solicit input from local communities and lawmakers early in the process if solar development is being considered," he stated.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's MI Healthy Climate Plan, an effort to combat human-driven climate change enacted in 2020, calls for 100% carbon neutrality by 2050 and 60% renewable energy in Michigan by 2030. How reachable those goals will be without state land involvement to build large solar farms is uncertain.
"I think there are potential avenues to meet those goals, but it certainly becomes a lot harder if you take these publicly managed lands off the table," said Ashley Rudzinski, climate and environment program director with the Groundwork Center for Resilient Communities, a Traverse City-based nonprofit organization with goals to "protect the environment, strengthen the economy, and build thriving communities."
The center on its website is urging Michigan residents to ask the state to continue support solar leasing on public lands.
"There's a fairly strong precedent for using lands that are already disturbed or marginal lands," Rudzinski said. "We're not talking pristine forestlands here; we are talking areas that are adjacent to highways or industrial sites.
"We have to recognize that for us to combat the challenges that are very real that we are facing with the climate crisis, we need to be able to make some of these challenging decisions ... including using some of these already disturbed lands for these types of practices."
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State Rep. Ken Borton, R-Gaylord, was among the first to sound public alarms over the proposed Hayes Township state forestland being used for utility-scale solar, prompting an outcry. He said DNR forestry officials contacted him in the days leading up to Bowen's May 9 email, and Borton said he was told the DNR was stopping solar project siting on state forest lands altogether.
"The memo (DNR Director Bowen) made is nothing like what we talked about," Borton said. "I am extremely unhappy at this point, and I made it very clear to the department: There will be no more solar going up on publicly owned lands."
The DNR manages 4.6 million acres of public land for uses including forestry, public recreation, hunting, fishing and wildlife habitat management. The agency historically has leased portions of public lands for a variety of perceived public goods, including industrial development.
"Lands managed by the DNR host hydrocarbon processing facilities, pipelines and flowlines, mines, sand and gravel pits, an asphalt plant and cell phone towers," Bowen stated in his May 9 memo.
The state has pledged to use no more than 4,000 acres of state-managed public land for solar development, and Bowen noted that some 350,000 acres of state-managed land is currently leased for gas an oil wells. Since 1928, more than 10,000 drilling permits have been issued on state-managed forestland.
"With the state shifting toward more renewable energy options the DNR is seeking to be part of the state's transition to cleaner energy," Bowen stated.
But oil and gas development and utility-scale solar farms are not analogous, Borton said.
"I live in northern Michigan, there are gas sites all over, including next to the property I own," he said. "Those gas sites take up almost no property whatsoever. They are not fenced in; they are not blocked off. They do not stop wildlife from passing through."
Borton said degraded state sites like brownfields or small solar projects at state fish hatcheries to provide energy to the facilities may still make sense. But "any industrial projects where they are coming in and clearing forest, I'm going to be opposed to it," he said.
Two utility-scale solar projects already in the works on state-managed property will continue, Bowen stated: the Groveland mine tailings site, a 264-acre site in the Upper Peninsula's Dickinson County; and the Roscommon Conservation Airport site, on 1,050 acres of DNR-managed public land in Roscommon County's Higgins Township near Interstate 75 and the DNR Conservation Airport. The maximum buildable area for solar panels on that project would be 570 acres, DNR officials earlier said.
Contact Keith Matheny: kmatheny@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: DNR halts state land leases for utility-scale solar projects
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