Solar panels that generate power for a data center in Wise County. (Charlie Paullin/Virginia Mercury)
A landowner in Louisa County is tangled up in disputes over how her land should be developed, reflecting an ongoing debate over the state’s role in solar energy development in rural areas. She wants a solar project to be built on her property, but local authorities want her land to stay agricultural use-only. Two years into the process she’s still waiting for a resolution, as legislation addressing solar ordinances, which could help mitigate the situation, failed again in the General Assembly this year.
“Really it is about land rights and landowner rights within the confines of still protecting the rural character of Louisa,” Amanda Lloyd said.
Lloyd inherited her husband’s family land when he died ten years ago. His grandparents had run a dairy farm on it until the 1980s and after that, the land was zoned partial residential and forestland. After building a home for her children, she researched how her property could be used to turn a profit.
“I worked with farm services. I had different people come out and look at it. I took classes at Virginia State University to try to figure out an agricultural use, and was just doing that over the years to see if there was a way I could use the land and bring it back and economically, I just never found a solution,” Lloyd said.
In 2020, the solar energy company Clenera approached her with a proposed solar project that would sprinkle panels through the timberland. It was a project that interested her. With trees that could act as natural buffers, which the county requires for these projects, and railroad tracks that separate her property from neighboring plots, Lloyd felt it would be a reasonable way to bring money in for her children’s futures and make use of the land.
In 2022, the county passed a new ordinance with several conditions for solar applications including buffer zones, environmental impacts and a cap on how much of the land mass may be used for solar projects. In 2023, county officials said there were already 590MW worth of approved solar projects that took up about 5,200 acres. Two projects had already been built with others in the pipeline to either start construction or the permitting process.
Llyod’s project was tabled in a 2023 Louisa County Planning Commission meeting, with a 4-4 vote.
In the meeting, a recording of which was viewed by the Virginia Mercury, Chairman John Disosway said that Llyod’s application was one of the best they had seen by that time, in terms of following the conditions laid out by the county and having natural barriers planned. He was concerned, however, about the loss of agricultural land, which would be changed into industrial land by solar and other projects. He said that type of zoning change had been happening at an “alarming rate” and cited it as a reason he could not support the project. Clenera and Llyod have been trying to work with the county ever since to find an agreement to move the project forward.
This sort of discussion is not a new one in Virginia. Del. Rip Sullivan, D-Fairfax, said that solar and agriculture do not need to be pitted against each other and it’s possible to marry the two industries to make land like Llyod’s even more profitable and useful in tackling the state’s energy needs.
“There is a way for us to honor and continue our agricultural history and the importance of agriculture as part of our economy and pair that with what everyone agrees is all of our energy needs” Sullivan said.
State Sen. Creigh Deeds, D-Charlottesville, brought SB 1190, a companion bill to Sullivan’s HB 2126, that would have created the Virginia Energy Facility Review Board to review and analyze local solar ordinances. The board would not override local ordinances, but rather assist local leaders by making recommendations on how to implement specific projects. The bill failed in the Senate and was left in the House’s Labor and Commerce committee this year, and faced fierce pushback from local governments and the solar industry.
“The reality is we’ve got this Clean Economy Act, whether you like it or not, it’s the law,” Deeds said, speaking of Virginia’s landmark legislation that mandates Virginia decarbonize its electricity sources by 2050. “We’ve got a requirement to produce power through renewable means to decarbonize our electric production system, and we’re not going to meet our goals if we don’t move forward with solar.”
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The rights of local governments and landowners are being weighed against some legislators and citizens’ calls for consistent regulations across the state, an issue also playing out across the country as states consider solar regulations.
The goal of the review board his bill sought to create, Deeds said, would be to provide localities with guidance on the best ways to implement solar projects in their areas, especially areas with smaller staffs and limited resources. It would be a small step toward addressing a big problem, Sullivan said.
“We’ve got a growing statewide energy demand without really any statewide strategy on how much and where in relation to data centers. We need to have a strategy to meet generation needs,” Sullivan said.
Deeds said he fully intends to bring back a version of his legislation again in the future. Meanwhile, other state leaders and candidates are speaking up about how to fulfill the state’s energy needs. A group of GOP House members slammed Democratic gubernatorial nominee Abigail Spanberger’s plans to expand solar, framing it and other renewable energy sources as insufficient to meet the energy demands of the commonwealth.
“Of course it’s not, it’s not enough, but you’ve got to do it. It’s got to be part of a solution. We need a multi-faceted approach to our energy needs,” Deeds said.
Like Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Republican governor candidate Winsome Earle-Sears has advocated for an “all-of-the-above” approach to fueling Virginia’s future, saying both renewable and fossil fuel energy sources should be used.
Lloyd’s proposed project would have been a 20MW energy producer encompassing 100 acres total spread over 300 acres of her land. She said the project would have benefitted the area beyond energy production through taxes, even more so than if the land were to remain in agricultural use.
There is no word yet of when Lloyd’s project will be back in front of the Louisa commission for a new vote. County officials did not respond to requests for comment.
“I am actively growing timber on that property. That’s an agricultural use. I am paying less in taxes because of that agricultural use. Turning it into a solar opportunity, or solar farm increases the tax base,” Lloyd said.
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Author: Shannon Heckt
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