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Spotlight

A Solar Developer Strikes Back at ‘Corrupt’ Officials in Pennsylvania

Rockland Solar accuses East Fairfield, Pennsylvania, of “municipal extortion.”

An alleged bribe.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

A solar developer is accusing a Pennsylvania town of requesting a $150 million bribe to get its permits, calling it “municipal extortion.”

Rockland Solar – a subsidiary of utility-scale solar developer Birch Creek – filed a federal lawsuit last week accusing officials in the northern Pennsylvania township of East Fairfield of intentionally moving the goalposts for getting permits to build over the span of multiple years. Rockland’s attorneys in the litigation describe the four officials controlling the township’s board of supervisors as engaging in “corrupt” behavior to deny the project, “ultimately culminating in the solicitation of a bride of more than $150,000,000” in exchange for approval of its application to develop land in the township.

The federal complaint scans as a horror story in solar development. Applications for Rockland Solar’s project were first filed in 2021 and granted approval from the township’s zoning officials in 2022, per the company’s legal complaint. But things seem to have gone south when Rockland Solar sought approval of its first land use application from the town, as replies to emails from town officials became scattershot and sporadic.

In August 2024, per the lawsuit, East Fairfield officials scheduled a crucial public meeting to decide whether to approve the application without notifying Rockland Solar itself, which the company claims was an intentional move “in corrupt and underhanded bad faith” meant “to consider, and then deny” the application “without providing due process.” According to the lawsuit, one of the reasons for the denial was that the project was located within the township – despite it already being approved by zoning officials.

Rockland Solar then took the town to Pennsylvania claims court over the decision because it was reached after a statutory deadline, according to the lawsuit. Amidst this legal fight, the company submitted a second application to build the project – making what the company says were many size and setback changes intended to address the reasons for the apparent denial. East Fairfield ultimately denied the project again. But the developer kept trying, negotiating in apparent good faith with the town’s lawyers to try and reach an agreement.

Then came the alleged request for a bribe. Per a letter cited in the legal complaint, officials asked the developer to pay the town annual payments every year the project was operating – starting at $5,000 and then increasing 25% “every year for the life of the facility,” and that land owners bordering the property would also need to be “compensated 10% of their current property value.” Rockland Solar’s attorneys calculated the annual payments alone to total at least $3 million in the thirtieth year of the project and $30 million a decade later.

Altogether, Rockland Solar’s attorneys landed on the whopping $150 million figure, stipulating that this figure doesn’t include the payments to neighboring property owners. The company argues that this “solicitation of money by a township commissioner to a developer” in exchange for “favorable treatment of a land use application” violated the state bribery statute.

I’ve seen a lot of conflict writing The Fight – including lots of lawsuits filed by developers and residents alike – but I’d never seen an escalation this profound. Normally, suing the town you’re building a project in is a bad idea because it can spoil the well of public trust. I can’t help but think this maneuver was a last resort for Rockland Solar.

It’s also quite rare to get an inside look at the negotiations between a developer and a town. We’re used to seeing community benefit agreements and compacts come and go and I’ve told you how those deals have mixed results. Rockland Solar is now a case study in perhaps one of the worst ways those talks can end up.

I reached out to Rockland Solar’s attorneys, as well as Birch Creek, but failed to hear back. I also tried to reach officials in East Fairfield to hear their take on these extraordinary claims, but no dice. Here’s hoping that writing this leads to them reaching out as well, because this is fascinating and I want to learn more for all of you!

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Q&A

How the Wind Industry Can Fight Back

A conversation with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications

The Q&A subject.
Heatmap Illustration

Today’s conversation is with Chris Moyer of Echo Communications, a D.C.-based communications firm that focuses on defending zero- and low-carbon energy and federal investments in climate action. Moyer, a veteran communications adviser who previously worked on Capitol Hill, has some hot takes as of late about how he believes industry and political leaders have in his view failed to properly rebut attacks on solar and wind energy, in addition to the Inflation Reduction Act. On Tuesday he sent an email blast out to his listserv – which I am on – that boldly declared: “The Wind Industry’s Strategy is Failing.”

Of course after getting that email, it shouldn’t surprise readers of The Fight to hear I had to understand what he meant by that, and share it with all of you. So here goes. The following conversation has been abridged and lightly edited for clarity.

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Hotspots

A New York Town Bans Both Renewable Energy And Data Centers

And more on this week’s most important conflicts around renewable energy.

The United States.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Chautauqua, New York – More rural New York towns are banning renewable energy.

  • Chautauqua, a vacation town in southern New York, has now reportedly issued a one-year moratorium on wind projects – though it’s not entirely obvious whether a wind project is in active development within its boundaries, and town officials have confessed none are being planned as of now.
  • Apparently, per local press, this temporary ban is tied to a broader effort to update the town’s overall land use plan to “manage renewable energy and other emerging high-impact uses” – and will lead to an ordinance that restricts data centers as well as solar and wind projects.
  • I anticipate this strategy where towns update land use plans to target data centers and renewables at the same time will be a lasting trend.

2. Virginia Beach, Virginia – Dominion Energy’s Coastal Virginia offshore wind project will learn its fate under the Trump administration by this fall, after a federal judge ruled that the Justice Department must come to a decision on how it’ll handle a court challenge against its permits by September.

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Spotlight

The Wind Projects Breaking the Wyoming GOP

It’s governor versus secretary of state, with the fate of the local clean energy industry hanging in the balance.

Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

I’m seeing signs that the fight over a hydrogen project in Wyoming is fracturing the state’s Republican political leadership over wind energy, threatening to trigger a war over the future of the sector in a historically friendly state for development.

At issue is the Pronghorn Clean Energy hydrogen project, proposed in the small town of Glenrock in rural Converse County, which would receive power from one wind farm nearby and another in neighboring Niobrara County. If completed, Pronghorn is expected to produce “green” hydrogen that would be transported to airports for commercial use in jet fuel. It is backed by a consortium of U.S. and international companies including Acconia and Nordex.

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