Daily Hampshire Gazette – Will local control be lost? The state’s climate bill likely usurps authority over where clean energy infrastructure is located

Regional planning groups and local municipalities remain wary of the looming consequences for municipal jurisdictions if a massive state climate bill with promises to reform the slow siting and permitting process for clean energy infrastructure projects is introduced in the coming weeks.

The biggest change that needs to be made is to revamp the permitting process by creating a state-run clearinghouse where applicants looking to pursue large-scale projects will seek approval from the new state board. Local government authorities would still have the opportunity to vote on these projects, but they would not have the final say on whether to approve or reject them.

“To a large extent, (Governor Healey’s) administration believes that we will not meet our greenhouse gas reduction limits without significant siting and permitting reforms,” ​​Energy Undersecretary Michael Judge said during a Western Massachusetts Solar Forum webinar held on June 4.

Changes to the siting and permitting process, based on recommendations from Gov. Maura Healey’s Clean Energy Infrastructure Siting and Permitting Commission, are expected to be included in the massive climate bill that House and Senate Democrats plan to take up before Parliament ends its formal sessions in seven weeks.

The commission is tasked with recommending ways to accelerate clean energy projects in the state to help meet Massachusetts’ decarbonization goals.

Fixing a bad model

There is broad agreement among utilities, environmentalists and others that the current process is a poor model, the State House News Service reports.

In addition to how long it takes – in many cases years – the proceedings may be too complicated for the public. Siting deliberations are also costly for both supporters and opponents, do not always take into account the views of affected communities, and disproportionately affect communities whose residents are poorer, minority, or speak a language other than English.

State House News Service reported that the commission recommended consolidating all state, provincial and local permits required for larger clean energy infrastructure projects into a single permit to be issued by the Energy Facility Siting Board (EFSB) within no more than 15 months, as well as combining all local permits for smaller clean energy infrastructure projects into one consolidated permit that the municipality will issue in less than a year.

However, delegating siting and permitting powers to the EFSB for larger projects will replace the jurisdiction of local municipalities and residents who are directly impacted by solar and energy storage investments. The committee strongly calls for the community engagement requirement to be codified in the language of the bill, but a community service agreement – ​​a signed pact listing the assets a developer will provide to the community – is not required.

The same recommendations that remove municipal control also provide funding and a regional officer to guide inexperienced small governments and volunteer-led municipal boards through a new consolidated permitting process.

Loss of local authority

In the second part of a special UMass Extension Solar Forum, regional planning groups and municipal organizations across Western Massachusetts considered which parts of the new climate bill benefit local municipalities and which could potentially harm local control over this large clean energy infrastructure development.

“The proposals presented by the committee are truly a fantastic starting point for the conversation,” said Adrienne Núñez, legislative analysis specialist with the Massachussets Municipal Association. “However, there are many, many details that are unclear and could theoretically be determined through various regulatory processes. In the current situation, these details actually threaten to disempower local government authorities.”

The commission’s recommendations divide energy projects into two categories: solar, wind and biogas plants with a capacity of more than 25 megawatts and those with a capacity of less than 25 megawatts. The permitting and siting authority for the latter will remain with local municipalities, while the ESFB will oversee larger projects.

This division also applies to energy storage, where the threshold is 100 megawatts. Local governments or residents wishing to provide feedback on project applications under the jurisdiction of the ESFB are limited to advisory opinions.

“These advisory opinions are exactly that. Basically, these are suggestions that the developer doesn’t have to follow,” Núñez said.

Community engagement would occur before the developer submits an application to the ESFB in accordance with the prerequisites. Recommendations for increasing communication include:

▪Requirement for developers to hold two 90-minute hybrid meetings about the project, during which half of the time is devoted to residents’ questions.

■Engage community organizations to help develop community contracts.

▪Establish a minimum 60-day public comment period.

▪ Organize meetings of the developer, city official and project authors.

“Too often, community engagement starts too late. This is a really key opportunity for meaningful community engagement to kind of guide the process,” said Sanjana Paul, a technical associate at MIT’s Renewable Energy Clinic who studies conflict mediation in the clean energy transition. “We really believe that to build trust and achieve equitable outcomes, we need to start engaging stakeholders as soon as a project idea is moved to a physical location.”

However, as Samantha Hamilton, director of Live Well Springfield, commented during the forum, “true engagement means acting on the voices we hear” and “intentionally incorporating feedback into the plan,” rather than simply listening to community concerns.

Although not required, the committee strongly recommends that the bill include community benefit agreements that encourage clean energy developers to select responsible project sites, hire local companies for planning and construction, specify a minimum amount of energy produced by a facility, that will remain in the community and offer solar energy to low-income communities.

Ken Comia of the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission suggests that planning boards or city and town planners who lack the knowledge or staff to enter into such agreements could apply a similar model to community benefit meetings held at cannabis facilities.

Comia also sees the new consolidated permitting process as a positive outcome for local authorities. Each municipal board reviewing development, e.g. spatial planning and conservation commissions, will continue to issue decisions individually and then submit them in the same application. As Judge explained at the start of the forum, the integrated application will speed up a process that typically takes up to 10 years, not including additional time added by decision appeals.

Recommendations from the Commission on Siting and Permitting for Clean Energy Infrastructure suggest that the Department of Energy Resources establish a program to provide local governments with regional coordinators and technical assistance to alleviate performance problems.

“Standardization may come from elements of the process that involve local government,” said Catherine Ratte, director of the state Department of Zoning and Environment. “This is not a loss of local control. It is the application and integration of local control in the early stages of the permitting process, i.e. the design of the process.

However, MMA legal analyst Josie Ahlberg stated that standardization could limit municipal law enforcement to localization methods and rulemaking processes established by DOER and unidentified stakeholders, threatening the interests and authority of local governments.

“We know that future clean energy projects will touch every city and town across the Commonwealth, and that these projects have the potential to create significant disruption, but also significant opportunity,” she said. “We don’t want the benefits to the local process to be diluted as community members live with these projects for decades to come.”

The report uses material from the State House News Service.

Emilee Klein can be reached at [email protected].