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Westlands WD Launches Review Of Mega-Solar Farm

Would Bolster I-5 Transmission Corridors

Westlands Water District announced last week they would launch an environmental review of a planned 2400 megawatt solar industrial park on 24,000 acres in their jurisdiction – located in Kings County.

The big project – in the discussion stage for several years – would begin the multi-agency approval process to cluster solar farms along the busiest north-south power transmission corridor in the state adding capacity to that corridor as it seeks to draw solar developers to build what would be billions of dollars of solar panels in coming years.

In a chicken and egg scenario the developers and water district understand you can’t generate all those electrons without a way to get the juice to urban areas on this already busy energy corridor.

Sun vs Nuke

The review states that the the “overall pacing of solar development is expected to proceed at an average rate of 2,000 acres (or 200 MW) per year over 12 years.” At buildout – 2400 MW of electricity generation would exceed that of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.

Ironically, its another advocate group that just 2 years ago was pitching a similar size nuclear power plant to be located nearby – also in the Westlands – a plan that you don’t hear much about any more.

Wastelands engineer Kit Buelna said the water district would be holding a scoping session on the solar master plan April 9 at the Fresno Westlands office. A full environmental review could last a year or longer.

So why is this embattled water district – the focal point for many controversial water issues in California and the largest ag district in the US – now looking at the rewnewable energy business?

In their preliminary notice Westlands says they wish to “retire”  these “drainage impaired” lands, laden with salt and selenium and no longer receive surface water delivery for them from the federal Central Valley project. As such the lands would be considered non-prime and under the Williamson Act as amended in October 2011”would be eligible for conversion to Solar Access Easements.”

Offering these tainted ag lands to both regulators and developers is in contrast to large solar projects in California’s more biologically sensitive desert areas – hoping to attract favor for more Central Valley solar projects but still avoiding the prime ag-land issue raised by the Farm Bureau and others.

To encourage developers to locate solar farms in western Kings County the plan offers these objectives for the addition of the Westlands Transmission Corridor.

• Help provide reliability, flexibility, and stability to the State electrical grid by completing needed upgrades to the Gates to Los Banos segment of the Central California Transmission Corridor.
• Provide for electrical transmission through the areas of physically-impaired retired farmland in the interior eastern portions of the Westlands Water District in order to facilitate the productive reuse of these retired lands for renewable solar generation.
• Adopt a transmission route that achieves the primary objectives of this transmission facility in a manner that is cost-effective and results in the least impacts to the environment and the
agricultural community.

Political Headwinds

So called sponsors of the plan – land owners on or near the Shannon Ranch called Westside Holdings spokesperson Josh Martin adds several  other key points: The first pilot project is near and long term – the overall project faces political headwinds.
 
– Westside Holdings (Westlands Solar Park) now has a little more than 20MWs of short term projects under PPA negotiation or MOU aka “pilot” projects for the initial phase of the master plan.  The pilot projects are expected to begin construction in 2014.
 
– Leaders in the State of California and Federal Government have endorsed the idea of converting drainage impaired farm ground into solar generation but to date we have not yet seen the political will and ambition to join forces with Westlands and the Westlands Solar Park team to support the project in any major capacity, especially with identification and approval of new transmission that can serve the resource area as well as have additional reliability benefits in the central valley region.  Instead the state has focused continued efforts on the desert areas under the process known as DRECP trying to find new or different ways of developing projects in the CA desert.
 
The WSP team still believes strongly in the future of solar energy as a peaking energy resource in CA, the costs are coming down dramatically and retail prices are going up creating a convergence of greater opportunity on the near term horizon for the state solar market.  With some leadership from state regulators at the CEC, PUC, and ISO as well as federal agencies the Westlands Solar Park is well positioned for success that will benefit: farmers, environmental groups, and valley communities.

To distinguish the Westlands location from California desert locations an analysis of comparable costs for each found that solar PV projects in the Westlands Solar Park will have lower integration costs, be less susceptible to wildfires, and have no adverse environmental impacts, and no reduction in import capacity compared to similar sized solar projects in the desert.

While power delivered from Westlands might be 8% higher than some desert solar projects that receive more solar radiation – that cost can be more than offset by substantial savings in transmission costs from the Westlands says a 2011 study.

Lower Transmission Cost

The study compares the cost of delivering 800 MWs of solar PV production from the Westlands Solar Park at $2.27/MWh or about $70 million to upgrade the transmission network. Using figures from two large desert projects – far from the statewide grid – we see costs of $9.40 to $21.08/MWh in the case of SCE’s Lugo-Pisgah project, which could move as much as 1,750MWs with a total cost of $750 million. In another case, the transmission-related cost of renewable energy carried by the Pisgah-Lugo project is $24.32/MWh.

This puts the total transmission cost as much as 10X as much as the Central Valley site, and no unhappy tortoises. Convincing the leadership in the state at key agencies like the California Energy Commission,ISO and PUC that this makes sense is job-one for the proponents. Likewise for federal authorities who are backing huge desert projects in the  Ultimately, the big private utilities must be convinced as well.

The Westlands Solar Park(WSP) is the only state (RETI) designated renewable energy zone in Central California and it is the  state energy zone with the strongest levels of support from both environmental and agricultural communities say WSP.

By working to get all approvals in place Westlands – the water district and WSP -the developers – hope to have the pathway cleared perhaps a year from now so that solar developers won’t encounter long permitting delays and lawsuits that they often find elsewhere in California.

Environmental Groups Back Project

Environmentalists seem to back the idea.

In 2012 Defenders of Wildlife strongly recommended steering more solar projects ”to low-value, low-conflict areas and degraded agricultural lands—aiming to avoid or minimize adverse impacts on wildlife, valuable agricultural lands, and high-value resource lands such as vernal pools, foraging habitat, riparian corridors and transitional biotic zones. This approach has two clear benefits: protecting vital natural resources and speeding up the permitting process for renewable energy projects.”

Defenders pointed out that “Energy planners are concerned over the cost of adding transmission lines to move renewable power from rural areas where it is expected to be generated to urban areas where it is needed.”

Back then former Sierra Club spokesperson Carl Zichella said “They could build 1000MW of solar power in Westlands right now without adding any new transmission capacity”. Zichella strongly supported the idea of placing utility-size solar on retired farmlands like in the Westlands. The lands are tainted by salinity and contamination and unlike more natural areas – attract little wildlife.

“I see plenty of reasons to do the Westlands solar project and no reasons why not.”

Already the Westlands Water District has welcomed several other solar projects in the face of more drought as well as regulatory cut-backs on water. As a result, many of the district’s farmers are seeking new economic uses for their land.

The majority of the solar PV projects proposed for Fresno County are in the district, including the high-profile Westlands Solar Farms (not affiliated with Westlands Solar Park). Other large Westlands WD located solar projects are Mustang in Kings County on 1400 acres being proposed by Recurrent and in Fresno County – a 1890 acre project near Mendota being  proposed by SunPower that could generate 200MW. The 100MW Henrietta project in Kings County is also in the district-  owned now by SunPower and moving forward with a power purchase agreement in hand from PG&E.

Defenders Of  Wildlife argue that such projects on “degraded” and “impaired” ag lands will help avoid farmland of higher quality as well as avoiding sites that are more sensitive environmentally with wildlife impacts for example – some desert site proposals pending.
To help this area the group urges the PUC to upgrade electricity infrastructure in this sector both north/south and east/west arguing a mid-state location makes more sense geographically, financially and environmentally. Because of the renewable power potential in Kern, Kings,Tulare and Fresno counties, upgrading the transmission infrastructure or not – will tell the tale of just how big Westlands Solar Park as well as other Central Valley renewables will get.

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