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Board Holds Hearing on Enhanced Energy Plan, Hears from Project Opponents

Posted: August 22, 2024

SHAFTSBURY - Divisions in town opinion affected the formulation of Shaftsbury's first-ever Enhanced Energy Plan, which will become part of the Town Plan when approved.

The Select Board held the first of two public hearings on the plan after its regular meeting on Monday. The second public hearing will be held on Sept. 23.

The plan, prepared by Bennington County Regional Commission and the Shaftsbury Planning Commission between Sept. 2023 and Feb. 2024, "summarizes energy use in Shafts-bury and what kind of changes will need to be made in that energy use and energy production in order to achieve the state goal of 90 percent renewable energy by 2050," said Select Board Chair Naomi Miller.

"So, each town as well as each region has taken on the burden of adjusting our own energy production and consumption," she said.

Miller gave a synopsis of the plan at Monday's hearing. The Planning Commission made recommendations that are scattered throughout the document. "These include constraints associated with solar facilities and wind turbines," she said.

"No solar facilities will be permitted in which the solar panels cover more than 20 acres of land, and no wind turbines will be permitted greater than 40 feet in height," the plan states.

"Having sat on the Planning Commission, as most of this was going forward, I can just say that the commission's effort throughout the process was to cut an immediate line in the middle between the two sides of this issue," Miller said. "This town is tremendously divided. So what the planning Commission did was to sort of create a final outcome that nobody would end up being happy with."

Select Board Vice Chair Martha Cornwell sat on the Planning Commission during much the process of drafting the document. "There were very disparate opinions about things and trying to come up with a plan that represented all

of the different perspectives of the community," she said.

"This was not a bell curve, this is what they call bimodal distribution," Miller added. "There was very very little overlap of what people wanted in terms of conditions and descriptions."

Particularly controversial is an 83acre, 20-megawatt "Shaftsbury Solar" generating facility planned for Holy Smoke Road.

The CEO of the company contracted to build the facility told the Select Board on Sept. 5 that he expects a decision on approval of the project from the state Public Utility Commission (PUC) before the end of the year. Reed Wills, CEO of SunEast Development, said those involved expect the facility to be generating electricity in 2026.

Miller said the limits in the Enhanced Energy Plan will not affect this project because the plan was not in effect when the project was proposed.

According to the local plan, taking into account existing solar generation in 2015, the Bennington County Regional Energy Plan determined that Shaftsbury should aim to develop an additional 10.5 MW of solar capacity by 2050 to help meet regional and state energy targets. Miller said that the Shaftsbury Solar project would more than satisfy this requirement, but that doesn't necessarily rule out other projects being proposed.

"We aren't in control of it," she said.

Two active opponents of the solar project spoke during public comment at the beginning of the meeting. They raised flooding and aesthetic concerns in particular.

"As I've said, multiple times in the past. We're not against solar, but we are against an industrial-size solar farm in a small rural community," said Dr. Michael Algus.

He expressed concern about flooding and erosion of Holy Smoke Road during construction.

"I think the town needs to be concerned about this. When when the road floods, which we fully expect will happen during the construction. Who's responsible? Is this part of the Host Town agreement? I don't think so," he said. "Is it Shaftsbury Solar? Is it the town of Shaftsbury that has to fix the road?"

Stella Ehrich is a painter who frequently paints landscapes that include the property where the facility is planned.

"My property backs up onto the Studio Hill Farm, and I often go out there to paint the landscape, because the views up there are just incredible," she said. "I've also taken groups of painters there to do workshops on landscape painting, and these have included people from out of state, because our state has the reputation for natural beauty."

She said when she heard that there was going to be an industrial sized dollar display on the landscape, she was a little bit devastated. "Because I certainly wouldn't include that in any of my paintings," she added. "I also wouldn't want to paint there, because the landscape is important to me, in the sense that when you have a continuous view of natural beauty of fields and forests and grasslands, then you get a sense of peace and serenity that I think we all share and we all recognize. And so I wanted to know more about it."

After a recent news article about Shaftsbury Solar, she realized that many people, including the Select Board, did not know of all the research that opponents have been doing about the project, Ehrich said.

"My hope is that some of the experts that have testified for us, will come and testify for you, and that you will have the same learning curve that I've had in this whole process," she said.

Compliments of: The Bennington Banner
Posted/Author: Mark Rondeau

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