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Spotlight

Anatomy of a Texas NIMBY

Inside a solar fight in the “cowboy capital of the world.”

Texas flag.
WikiCommons / Ricardo Gomez-Angel / Heatmap

An hour northwest of San Antonio, Texas, the small town of Bandera is home to fewer than 1,000 people. Complete with old-timey heritage buildings from the Old West, the town markets itself as a ranching tourism destination and the “cowboy capital of the world.”

And some residents really don’t want the solar farm coming to town: Pine Gate Renewables’ Rio Lago solar project, which would produce 132 megawatts of power. That’s enough renewable electricity to fuel almost 23,000 homes.

When the project first appeared on homeowners’ doorsteps, citizens concerned about building anything at industrial scale in their bucolic community rejected a local tax abatement and began speaking to local media. Eventually, roughly a dozen people living near the proposed Rio Lago site filed a lawsuit in state court seeking damages for alleged sediment runoff, along with a laundry list of other complaints. The state court judge was sympathetic to the individuals in Bandera, ordered construction to stop and sanctioned Pine Gate when residents said the company appeared to continue work on the project. The case is now pending in federal court.

Taken together this outcry, lawsuit, and all of the resulting local news coverage coverage add up to a crucial test: Can a handful of people block carbon-free power to so many homes?

In this circumstance, probably not. Last week, the federal judge now overseeing the case – Richard Farrer, who was appointed under Trump in 2017 – told the aggrieved homeowners and their lawyer that while the allegations of damages may still proceed to trial, there was “not sufficient evidence of imminent irreparable harm to support” an order to stop construction, according to a transcript of the hearing.

But still, this case still fascinates. That’s because despite Texas’ conservative political leaning the Lone Star state is a panacea for renewables development. It produces 16% of the nation’s total renewable energy but accounts for only 2.5% of the contested projects, restrictive ordinances, and moratoriums in Heatmap Pro’s database. Part of the reason Texas is so receptive is that energy production overall is pretty welcome – when you’re so used to oil rigs, a solar farm isn’t that big of a deal. For its part, Pine Gate clearly thinks it’s a great place to build as the company claims to have forty projects at various stages in the state.

The case of Bandera and the Rio Lago solar project ultimately illustrates NIMBYism – historically understood as more of an issue amongst liberals – can occur in even the most staunchly conservative parts of the country: the town is represented in Congress by Rep. Chip Roy, who has a 96% lifetime score from the Heritage Foundation’s political arm and a month ago called to fully defund the Energy Department’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

Ultimately, while renewable energy and decarbonization capital is pouring into culturally red areas across the U.S., this conflict demonstrates how a backlash can really rear its ugly head.

Jennifer Rosenblatt, a lawyer representing the homeowners opposed to the solar farm, told me her litigation isn’t “anti-solar” and “simply a construction issue.” But she acknowledged the residents are motivated by a simple and familiar adage: “Nobody wants it in their backyard.”

“All things being equal, they don’t want it there,” Rosenblatt said. “Everybody wants to say it’s a lawsuit about ‘not in my backyard,’ but in Texas you can’t control what somebody does on their property next door. There’s no lawsuit about that.”

We’ll keep you updated on the status of this lawsuit in future editions of The Fight.

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Spotlight

Why County Commissioners Matter for the Climate

Inside a wild race sparked by a solar farm in Knox County, Ohio.

Drenda Keesee.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images, Screenshot/Vimeo

The most important climate election you’ve never heard of? Your local county commissioner.

County commissioners are usually the most powerful governing individuals in a county government. As officials closer to community-level planning than, say a sitting senator, commissioners wind up on the frontlines of grassroots opposition to renewables. And increasingly, property owners that may be personally impacted by solar or wind farms in their backyards are gunning for county commissioner positions on explicitly anti-development platforms.

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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.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

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.

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Policy Watch

The Climate Election’s Big Local Votes

What happened this week in climate and energy policy, beyond the federal election results.

Map of South Dakota for the Summit Carbon Solutions CO2 pipeline.
Heatmap illustration.

1. It’s the election, stupid – We don’t need to retread who won the presidential election this week (or what it means for the Inflation Reduction Act). But there were also big local control votes worth watching closely.

  • South Dakotans at the ballot box successfully defeated a law intended to expedite approvals and construction of the Summit Carbon Solutions CO2 pipeline, my colleague Emily Pontecorvo writes.
  • In Morro Bay, California, almost 60% of voters weighed in to support stopping a battery energy storage facility. Developer Vistra announced plans for an alternative permitting pathway a day before voting commenced.
  • In Oregon, voters in two coastal counties overwhelmingly voted to reject offshore wind in a non-binding resolution.
  • In Maine, the small town of Harpswell might’ve gone for vice president Kamala Harris – but it also rejected opening land to a small solar farm.
  • Heatmap did a full accounting of climate and energy races across the country. Take a gander!

2. Michigan lawsuit watch – Michigan has a serious lawsuit brewing over its law taking some control of renewable energy siting decisions away from municipalities.

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