For some local farmers, installing solar panels has not only reduced their carbon footprint but provided a much welcome and stable source of income even as crop markets fluctuate and the weather does as it will.
Rep. Todd Lippert, DFL-Northfield, is drafting a bill that would give farmers more flexibility to put up solar. Not everyone is on board — in fact, the Board of Supervisors in Bridgewater Township, which Lippert represents, recently enacted an ordinance intended to do the opposite.
Under Lippert’s bill, which has not yet officially been introduced into the legislature, farmers would be able to put panels on land designated as “prime farmland” under standards set by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Kenyon area farmer Joe Grote is among the local farmers who have benefited from solar. Though the installation on his land is small compared to some, Grote said that the results have been more than satisfactory.
For Grote, the primary reason for embracing solar was economics. Thanks to generous rebate programs from the state and federal governments as well as Xcel Energy, upfront costs were manageable and the installation should pay for itself within a few years.
“Cutting that electricity bill down was our primary motivator,” Grote said. “It’s been a great thing for the farm.”
When it comes to using prime farmland for solar developments, Grote said he can see both sides of the issue. On one hand, he’d like to see prime farmland be used to feed people — but he also understands those who would like to see the government take a lighter regulatory touch.
“There’s a lot of land that isn’t quite as nice for farming, that would be better for solar use,” he said. “But I get it when people say that their land is their land and they’d like to be able to do what they want with it.”
Lippert and his bill’s supporters maintain that the legislation is a “win-win” for rural communities. The Northfield legislator said that current regulations were written in a pre-solar era and make more sense when it comes to constructing a fossil fuel related plant than a solar garden.
St. Charles-area farmer Ralph Kahler, a former DFL State Senate candidate and partner in a solar energy company who testified on behalf of the bill, pointed out that only about two-thirds of Minnesota farmland is in use.
Allowing solar to be put on even a fraction of that land could enable the state to meet its clean energy goals with minimal impact on agriculture, Kahler maintains. The bill includes a provision that would require solar gardens to minimize their impact on surrounding agricultural land.
For Greenvale Township Supervisor Greg Langer, solar has been more of a nightmare. Langer and some of his neighbors have suffered water runoff issues from panels installed on St. Olaf College land, even as the company behind the panels has claimed to have fixed the problem. Despite his negative experience, Langer said he’s not opposed to solar panels on the whole. However, he opposes repealing the protections like the productive farmland rule because he doesn’t want to lose land that could be used for traditional ag.
Without those protections, Langer is concerned that economic incentives could drive people to solar. Kahler for example said that solar can produce $800 per year over a 25- to 30-year contract, while profit per acre for traditional crops can be much more modest.
“My hopes are the people who own these lands would be driven by a sense of doing the right thing rather than by the money,” Langer said.
At last month’s meeting, Bridgewater Township’s Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution that is much in line with the state’s prime farmland protection rule. If farmers want to put solar on productive land, they’d have to apply for a special permit from the Township Board.
Bridgewater Supervisor Glen Castore said that applicants in parts of the township can continue to apply for a solar permit, and for them the application process would be significantly easier. Nonetheless, he said, the Township Board’s belief is that ag land should receive special protection.
