PSC signs off on plan for sprawling solar farm

The Public Service Commission of Wisconsin last week unanimously approved Onion River Solar, a 150-megawatt solar farm to be developed in the Town of Holland by Ranger Power, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based firm.

The decision is the final regulatory approval needed for the project, which will be built on roughly 1,000 acres of primarily farmland in the northwest corner of the township.  

“We are grateful for the commission’s ongoing commitment to bringing safe, clean and economical renewable energy resources to Wisconsin,” Project Manager Emily Straka of Ranger Power said. 

Ranger Power has 40-year rental agreements for almost 1,900 acres owned by 13 property owners. The solar farm will only use about 1,000 acres, with the remaining land returned to landowners.

Construction of the facility is expected to begin by the end of the year, with the project completed by late 2022.

While the proposed solar farm has divided this rural community, the PSC’s decision didn’t seem to surprise anyone.

“Was it gut-wrenching to finally hear it? Yea. Were we surprised, no,” Ellie Hudovernik said. “Were we angry, yes.”

Hudovernik, who said she and her husband Robert were the “voice of the opposition,” said they are concerned the massive solar farm to be built in the northwest corner of the township will reduce property values, harm the environment and wildlife and contaminate the Onion River.

It will also, she said, destroy the bucolic nature of the rural community.

“You’re literally going to take my rural landscape from me,” she said. “This is the industrialization of rural America. That is taking place right before our eyes.”

Hudovernik decried what she said was a veil of secrecy around the project that kept residents from having more of an impact, noting Ranger Power secured leases with area farmers before its plans went public.

“Had I been notified at the very beginning, I would have been given the opportunity to put my property on the market and sell it at full value,” she said.

The Onion River project should stand as a warning to all residents of rural lands, she added, noting power generation firms are looking throughout the state for farmland to lease for solar and wind farms.

While Hudovernik paints a bleak picture of the solar farm, Town Chairman David Huenink said the project is “received fairly well” by the majority of town residents and is good for the community.

“Most people, once they learn all the facts, don’t oppose the project. I think it’s a good project,” he said, noting alternative energy sources are in demand and solar is one of the least intrusive of these power sources. 

It also allows property owners who are leasing land to Ranger Power a steady source of income, something Huenink said is important to many of the farmers who are renting their property.

“Everyone knows how small family farms are going,” he said. “We’re very much a farming community. This is a guaranteed source of income for decades to come.”

The State of Wisconsin “basically strips all control” of these large solar projects from local municipalities, Huenink said, but he noted the town was able to negotiate a development agreement that will protect the community.

The agreement strives to mitigate the impact of the solar farm for people living nearby, requiring larger setbacks from their homes to the facility while allowing smaller setbacks to those who are renting their land, since they are benefitting from the project, Huenink said.

It also calls for landscaping and fencing and positioning the solar panels so they reduce glare, and it requires that the land used for the solar farm be restored to usable farmland once the facility is no longer in use, Huenink said.

The agreement also provides that, since the project will take land off the tax rolls, the Cedar Grove-Belgium and Oostburg school districts and Lakeshore Technical College will be paid whatever tax revenues it is losing due to its solar field each year by Ranger Power.

The company will also provide the Town of Holland $250,000 annually and Sheboygan County $350,000 annually in shared revenue.

The requirements of the agreement are binding on any entity who buys the facility — in this case, Alliant Energy, which received PSC approval in April to acquire, construct, own or operate six solar electric generation facilities in the state, including Onion River.