Urges Massachusetts officials to protect forests, waterways & communities from “solar gone wrong”

Plymouth-based Save the Pine Barrens and allies delivered 1,400 signatures on a petition to Governor Charlie Baker calling for a moratorium on ratepayer and taxpayer subsidies for large ground-mounted industrial solar installations that cut down forests, harm waterways and impact Native American cultural sites.

The petition arose from growing concerns that the state’s SMART solar subsidy program is incentivizing solar energy in all the wrong places – forested lands, residential neighborhoods, and on prime farmland, often threatening groundwater and wetlands.

News coverage below:

State House News Service:

Petitioners Want Limits On Large Solar Projects

Protesters Say Checks Needed On Growing Subsidy Program

Sam Drysdale10/27/22 5:38 PM

OCT. 27, 2022…..With signs proclaiming “Save Our Forests” and “Be Wise,” activists from across the state convened outside the State House Thursday afternoon before making their way to Gov. Charlie Baker’s office to deliver a petition calling for a moratorium on state financing for large industrial solar projects.

The petition, which supporters said had 1,400 signatures, aims to limit new ground-mounted solar projects to five acres or less and direct state subsidies to solar projects sited on rooftops or existing infrastructure.

Activists present on Thursday said more than 4,000 acres of forested land, open space and farmland have been cleared in Massachusetts for ground-mounted solar.

“We’re really killing the planet in order to save it,” said Meg Sheehan, a volunteer for Plymouth-based advocacy organization Save the Pine Barrens.

The petition takes issue with Massachusetts’ SMART solar subsidy program, which the activists said uses taxpayer and ratepayer money to subsidize industrial solar projects “being inappropriately sited on forested lands, farmlands, wetlands and Native American cultural sites.”

The Department of Public Utilities issued an order doubling the SMART program, which provides incentives to make solar energy economically feasible to municipalities, last year. The coalition supporting the moratorium calls the subsidy program “solar gone wrong.”

Their goal is not to shut down solar energy, said Warren Conservation Commission chair Joyce Eichacker, but to move forward “more wisely” in already built areas, such as parking lots, rooftops and existing infrastructure in urban areas, and on the verge and in the median of the Mass Pike.

Warren and other parts of central Massachusetts have been targeted for ground-mounted solar, Eichacker said.

“Between [Warren and Charlton] we have over 130 megawatts combined between our two towns and we have lost plenty of forest, probably 700 to 800 acres combined. It’s so devastating,” she said.

Sheehan, who is from Plymouth, chimed in that the southeastern part of the state has also been “targeted.”

Candidate for Norfolk County Commissioner Matthew Sheehan joined the activists Thursday afternoon, standing against the county commission’s engagement in a “destructive 30-acre ground-mounted solar project.”

The Norfolk County Commission’s proposed project on the campus of the Norfolk Agricultural School would require a clear-cut of four acres of trees, according to WBZ.

“It’s overwhelmingly against the wishes of the constituents, and they are ignoring people’s cries to implement solar in other, more appropriate locations,” Sheehan said.

-END-
10/27/2022

Channel WWLP TV, Springfield

Here

Greenfield Recorder

https://www.recorder.com/Petition-seeks-pause-on-solar-subsidies-for-large-scale-projects-48585829

Petition seeks pause on solar subsidies for large-scale projects

Pine Meadow Road in Northfield is the planned site of 76 acres of solar arrays. CONTRIBUTED/JIMMY POWELL

By BELLA LEVAVI

Staff Writer

Published: 10/27/2022 8:18:51 PM

Modified: 10/27/2022 8:18:37 PM

BOSTON — A petition created by the Greenfield-based Save Massachusetts Forests and the Plymouth-based Save the Pine Barrens was delivered to Gov. Charlie Baker on Thursday with more than 1,500 signatures from residents asking for a moratorium on state subsidies for large-scale solar projects.

The goal of the petition, which is directed at the Solar Massachusetts Renewable Target subsidy program administered by the state Department of Energy Resources, is to support ratepayer subsidies going to solar projects that are sited on rooftops or existing infrastructure. Under the moratorium, projects that do not seek state subsidies would not be impacted. Organizers say the moratorium would allow municipalities time to consider local bylaws to best address concerns about solar, and allow the public and experts time to work with lawmakers and regulators to amend the state’s solar subsidy program.

“We’re really killing the planet in order to save it,” said Meg Sheehan, a volunteer for Plymouth-based advocacy organization Save the Pine Barrens.

The petition takes issue with Massachusetts’ SMART solar subsidy program, which the activists said uses taxpayer and ratepayer money to subsidize industrial solar projects “being inappropriately sited on forested lands, farmlands, wetlands and Native American cultural sites.”

The Department of Public Utilities issued an order doubling the SMART program, which provides incentives to make solar energy economically feasible to municipalities, last year. The coalition supporting the moratorium calls the subsidy program “solar gone wrong.”

Their goal is not to shut down solar energy, said Warren Conservation Commission chair Joyce Eichacker, but to move forward “more wisely” in already built areas, such as parking lots, rooftops and existing infrastructure in urban areas, and on the verge and in the median of the Mass Pike.

Warren and other parts of central Massachusetts have been targeted for ground-mounted solar, Eichacker said.

“Between [Warren and Charlton] we have over 130 megawatts combined between our two towns and we have lost plenty of forest, probably 700 to 800 acres combined. It’s so devastating,” she said.

Sheehan, who is from Plymouth, chimed in that the southeastern part of the state has also been “targeted.”

Candidate for Norfolk County Commissioner Matthew Sheehan joined the activists Thursday afternoon, standing against the county commission’s engagement in a “destructive 30-acre ground-mounted solar project.”

The Norfolk County Commission’s proposed project on the campus of the Norfolk Agricultural School would require a clear-cut of four acres of trees, according to WBZ.

“It’s overwhelmingly against the wishes of the constituents, and they are ignoring people’s cries to implement solar in other, more appropriate locations,” Sheehan said.

Mass Audubon, the Massachusetts Land Trust Association, the New England Forestry Foundation and others in the coalition of grassroots nonprofits do not support a moratorium, but issued a joint statement in 2021 calling for “rapid, responsible siting of solar power systems” that “maximizes deployment of solar power on already developed or degraded land,” and if additional capacity is needed outside those areas, to “determine which natural or working lands and waters are most and least appropriate for solar energy.”

Governor Baker’s Office: Meg Sheehan and coalition delivers 1,400 moratorium petitions. 10/27/2022

New England Public Radio

Hampshire Daily Gazette

https://www.gazettenet.com/Petition-seeks-pause-on-solar-subsidies-for-large-scale-projects-48591567

Worcester Business Journal

https://www.wbjournal.com/article/state-house-protesters-call-for-limits-on-solar-projects