Vineyard Wind’s New Fight

1. Nantucket County, Massachusetts – A new group – Keep Nantucket Wild – is mobilizing opposition to the Vineyard Wind offshore wind project, seeking to capitalize on the recent blade breakage to sever the town of Nantucket’s good neighbor agreement with project developer Avangrid.

• Keep Nantucket Wild was started weeks ago by raw bar restaurateur Jesse Sandole and yoga studio owner Evie O’Connor. The group already has amassed more than 1,000 signatures on a petition to the town select board to pull out of the good neighbor agreement.
  
• Town officials have previously said they will renegotiate the pact, which included a $16 million company payment into a community fund and promises to reduce nighttime visual impacts.

2. East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana – One lowkey local election this fall may decide the future of Louisiana’s renewables: the swing seat on the state’s Public Service Commission, which is being vacated this year by a retiring moderate Republican.

• Only 3% of Louisiana’s power generation came from renewables last year but that’s poised for significant growth thanks to offshore wind development in the Gulf and the PSC’s decision over the summer to let Entergy expand its solar capacity in the state by 3 GW.
  
• State Sen. J.P. Coussan is one of the leading candidates for the opening on the PSC. A Republican, he said at an event last month that he’s open to more solar but is worried about “losing the farmland” that could be used by the sugar business. He also believes renewables will ultimately make up “lower than overall 10% of the power matrix.”
  
• There are two other candidates for the open seat: Republican former state Sen. Julie Quinn, who is a dyed-in-the-wool conservative and opposes renewables, and Democrat Nick Laborde, who deeply supports renewables but has never served in public office and currently works in human resources.

3. Logan County, Ohio – Invenergy’s Fountain Point solar project cleared a hurdle with the Ohio Power Siting Board last month. But the 280 megawatt proposal may face a lengthy appeals process, according to Mike Yoder, a county commissioner who had recently served as an ad hoc member of the OPSB.

• Yoder, whose county is where the project is proposed, told local radio on Monday that the project is not affected by a recent law empowering counties against solar and wind as challenges to the project began before the law was passed.
  
• But discussing potential challenges to the state Supreme Court, Yoder said he expects construction is still “well down the road.”
• “I know that we got some emails from folks who were concerned we would be voting on it and moving forward and everything happened in two or three days and that’s not really the way it’s going to be,” he said.

4. Riverside County, California – The federal government is now taking public comment on a 100+ megawatt solar farm proposed in the California desert in an area demarcated as a priority for energy development.

• The Sapphire Solar project, which was proposed by EDF Renewables, has also been targeted by wildlife conservationists focused on tortoise protection. Sound familiar?
  
• We’ll find out whether environmental concerns pervade at the government’s Oct. 24 in person and virtual public meetings on the project, which could shed new light on how stakeholders are grappling with solar projects on federally-preferred areas with wildlife conflicts.

Here’s some more fights we’re watching closely…

In Maryland, commissioners in eastern Berlin County have rejected a TurningPoint Energy utility-scale solar farm.

In New Jersey, the group Save Long Beach Island filed a notice of intent to sue against the Atlantic Shores offshore wind approvals last week.

In New York, the town of Oyster Bay has extended its battery storage moratorium for six months to block a project proposed by Jupiter Power Company.

In North Dakota, regulators told staff to put together a final order on the Summit Carbon Solutions CO2 pipeline, though no date or decision has been discussed.