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Hotspots

Is Washington State’s Huge Wind Farm Actually Out of Danger?

And more of the week’s most important conflicts around renewable energy.

Map.
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1. Madison County, Missouri – A giant battery material recycling plant owned by Critical Mineral Recovery exploded and became engulfed in flames last week, creating a potential Vineyard Wind-level PR headache for energy storage.

  • The explosion led surrounding communities to evacuate. As video of the explosion ricocheted across Facebook and elsewhere, EPA began giving regular public updates and the National Fire Protection Association put an explainer out about the risks of battery fires.
  • As of Monday, EPA was finding “occasional detections” of toxic hydrogen fluoride and particulate matter in the air but “below action levels … typically associated with flare-ups during the continued” safety efforts at the plant.
  • CMR did not respond to a request for comment.

2. Benton County, Washington State – Governor Jay Inslee finally got state approvals finished for Scout Clean Energy’s massive Horse Heaven wind farm after a prolonged battle over project siting, cultural heritage management, and bird habitat.

  • Inslee previously rejected a request by the state’s energy siting council to slash the size of Horse Heaven to accommodate environmental concerns and host community discontent. Some turbines were taken off of the project plans but nowhere near the recommended reduction.
  • I spoke with Paul Krupin at Tri-Cities CARES, a citizens group that was opposed to the scope of the project, who told me his organization and collaborating opponents in the Yakima tribe have yet to decide whether to challenge this approval in state court.
  • “We’re thinking about it,” he said, acknowledging some potential legal claims may have an uphill battle but Yakama tribal members may have a shot because of existing treaty rights.

3. Fulton County, Georgia – A large NextEra battery storage facility outside of Atlanta is facing a lawsuit that commingles usual conflicts over building these properties with environmental justice concerns, I’ve learned.

  • The litigation was filed in October in Fulton County Superior Court by three residents close to the proposed project site and challenges the legality of local regulators’ March approval of the battery project.
  • Activists have declared the project an environmental justice issue given the majority-black surrounding communities also claim to deal with other forms of disproportionate industrialization from Amazon warehouses.
  • “This is an older neighborhood … They’ve lived there my entire life. It’s one thing if you consciously decide to move into a neighborhood that has a battery storage facility,“ activist Mose James IV told podcaster Adrianne Hutchinson in September, “but for some reason on the South side – South Fulton – our neighbors, we look up and there’s warehouses surrounding each and every one of our neighborhoods.”
  • To watch the full interview with James and to hear how this battery fight portends environmental justice problems in the energy transition, here’s a link.

Here’s what else I’m watching…

In Colorado, Weld County commissioners approved part of one of the largest solar projects in the nation proposed by Balanced Rock Power.

In New Mexico, a large solar farm in Sandoval County proposed by a subsidiary of U.S. PCR Investments on land typically used for cattle is facing consternation.

In Pennsylvania, Schuylkill County commissioners are thinking about new solar zoning restrictions.

In Kentucky, Lost City Renewables is still wrestling with local concerns surrounding a 1,300-acre solar farm in rural Muhlenberg County.

In Minnesota, Ranger Power’s Gopher State solar project is starting to go through the public hearing process.

In Texas, Trina Solar – a company media reports have linked to China – announced it sold a large battery plant the day after the election. It was acquired by Norwegian company FREYR.

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Spotlight

The Blast Radius of Interior’s Anti-Renewables Order Could Be Huge

Solar and wind projects will take the most heat, but the document leaves open the possibility for damage to spread far and wide.

Wetlands, Donald Trump, and solar panels.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

It’s still too soon to know just how damaging the Interior Department’s political review process for renewables permits will be. But my reporting shows there’s no scenario where the blast radius doesn’t hit dozens of projects at least — and it could take down countless more.

Last week, Interior released a memo that I was first to report would stymie permits for renewable energy projects on and off of federal lands by grinding to a halt everything from all rights-of-way decisions to wildlife permits and tribal consultations. At minimum, those actions will need to be vetted on a project-by-project basis by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and the office of the Interior deputy secretary — a new, still largely undefined process that could tie up final agency actions in red tape and delay.

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Hotspots

Idaho’s Lava Ridge Wind Farm Faces a New Fight in Congress

We’re looking at battles brewing in New York and Ohio, plus there’s a bit of good news in Virginia.

The United States.
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1. Idaho — The LS Power Lava Ridge wind farm is now facing a fresh assault, this time from Congress — and the Trump team now seems to want a nuclear plant there instead.

  • House Republicans this week advanced an Interior Department appropriations bill that would indefinitely halt federal funding for any permits related to the proposed wind facility “unless and until” the president reviews all of its permits issued under the Biden administration. Biden had completed permitting right before Trump took office.
  • Trump had already ordered a stop to construction on the project as part of a Day 1 flurry of executive orders. But if this policy rider becomes law, it could effectively handcuff any future president after Trump from allowing Lava Ridge to move forward.
  • While Democrats tend to view riders like these unfavorably and attempt to get rid of them, government funding packages require 60 votes in the Senate to break a filibuster, which often means partisan policies from funding bills passed by previous Congresses are challenging to get rid of and can stick around for long stretches of time.
  • By that same logic, one would assume that the need to hit that 60 number now requires Democrats, so wouldn’t they need them and want to ditch this rider? Except one thing: it is exceedingly likely given past congressional fights that the party’s right flank in the House requests fresh concessions. Policy riders like these become chits in that negotiation – and I do expect this one to be an easy sop for this flank given the executive order is already in place.
  • There’s also the whole matter of whether LS Power will try to proceed with this project under a future president amidst increasing pressure on the company. That’s likely why Sawtooth Energy, an energy developer interested in building new small modular nuclear reactors, is now eyeing the project site.

2. Suffolk County, New York — A massive fish market co-op in the Bronx is now joining the lawsuit to stop Equinor’s offshore Empire Wind project, providing anti-wind activists a powerful new ally in the public square.

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Q&A

How to Fight Back Against Anti-Renewable Activists

Getting local with Matthew Eisenson of Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law.

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This week’s conversation is with Matthew Eisenson at Columbia Law School’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Eisenson is a legal expert and pioneer in the field of renewable energy community engagement whose work on litigating in support of solar and wind actually contributed to my interest in diving headlong into this subject after we both were panelists at the Society of Environmental Journalists’ annual conference last year. His team at the Sabin Center recently released a report outlining updates to their national project tracker, which looks at various facility-level conflicts at the local level.

On the eve of that report’s release earlier this month, Eisenson talked to me about what he believes are the best practices that could get more renewable projects over the finish line in municipal permitting fights. Oh — and we talked about Ohio.

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