[T]he state Senate approved a bill Thursday that proponents say will give towns the ability to dictate where renewable energy projects should be sited. The legislation passed on third reading by 22-3.
The bill directs the Public Service Board to defer to approved town plan specifications for renewable energy projects siting. The board can only sidestep a town plan if there is clear and convincing evidence that the public benefit of a project outweighs local planning priorities.
The new town and regional planning process for utility-sized renewable energy projects stops short of giving municipalities veto power.
Towns would, under the bill, receive certification for plans from regional planning commissions if the plans coincide with certified regional plans and further the state’s energy policies. Regional planning commissions, in turn, would certify town plans through the Department of Public Service.
The bill, S.230, underwent numerous revisions as it approached the final vote Thursday night, and senators proposed amendments that didn’t see the light of day.
Several lawmakers complained that good legislation isn’t made on the floor, and one senator said he voted against it for that reason.
The bill would appropriate $300,000 for the training of municipal and regional planners who would be charged with crafting energy siting provisions.
The legislation creates a public assistance officer position at the Public Service Board. The assistant would explain proceedings to citizens who are going before the board and answer procedural questions. The legislation also requires the assistant to offer advice on how best to participate in the board process, under a last-minute amendment by Sen. Michael Sirotkin, D-South Burlington.
Developers must present a lifecycle analysis of greenhouse gases produced in the process of completing a project, under the legislation. The analysis would include emissions resulting from the manufacture of a facility’s components, emissions involved in transporting components, emissions associated with preparation of a site, and emissions from building, operating and eventually decommissioning the facility.
The bill would offer financial incentives to developers who build renewable energy projects on what it calls “preferred locations,” such as parking lots, brownfields, quarries, rooftops, landfills, and those places towns specify in their municipal plans.
Rejected amendments include one Sen. John Rodgers, D-Glover, proffered near the Senate’s adjournment, that would remove certification requirements from town and regional plans. Bray said the proposal would prevent the bill from accomplishing its aim, which he characterized as marrying the state’s energy goals with town planning.
Rodgers said towns shouldn’t be forced to submit to a review process overseen by the politically-appointed Department of Public Service director.
The new town and regional planning process won’t give municipalities enough say over the placement of industrial scale renewable energy projects, Sen. Dustin Degree, R-St. Albans, said.
“It’s like saying, I don’t want you to punch me, but if you’re going to punch me in the face, I’d rather have you punch me in the arm,” Degree said.
The Senate rejected other amendments Rodgers sought to include in the bill, including one that would have required owners of existing and future wind turbines over 200 feet tall to pay an acoustical engineer to continuously monitor the structures’ noise levels. Rodgers withdrew several other amendments — among them one allowing non-lawyers to represent parties before the Public Service Board.
Rodgers, who is a member of the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Energy, and had voted in favor of the bill on its way out of the committee, but he cast a nay vote on the final version on the Senate floor because he said the original compromises he’d favored had been removed from the bill.
Degree also voted against the bill, as did Sen. David Zuckerman, P/D-Hinesburg. Zuckerman said the bill hadn’t been sufficiently vetted after undergoing numerous emendations during its final two days in the Senate. Everyone else voted in favor.
Correction: The bill would appropriate $300,000 for training, not $900,000 as stated in an earlier version of this story.
