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New Tulare Lakebed Solar Projects Include JG Boswell

sea of solar panels on Kings County farmland

Some Call For Moratorium?

Kings and Tulare Counties’ mostly dry Tulare Lake bed – once the largest body of water west of the Mississippi – is now sporting fields of solar panels by the thousands with more to come.

Tulare lakebed covers much of Kings County and SW Tulare County(click for larger view)

This past week two new solar project applications were received by the Kings County planning department including a 155 acre, 20 megawatt solar project on farm land owned by JG Boswell, the largest farmer on the old lakebed or anywhere else.

Historically,while the lakebed was often filled in winter with water -flooding in 1938 and 1955 prompted the construction of the Terminus and Success Dams on the Kaweah and Tule Rivers in Tulare County and Pine Flat Dam on the Kings River in Fresno County, rivers that all drain here. The lakebed’s outline can still be seen from the air covering  a large part of Kings County and a portion of western Tulare County.

While the farmland here grows crops there  are large fallow sections with high salinity soils – impaired farmland now considered ripe for solar development.

Tulare Lake drains key Central Valley rivers

According to the application, the Boswell solar farm would be developed by Solar Project Solutions(SPS) – a joint venture that includes Samsung Green Repower, LLC and Solar Managers, LLC. The group develops, finances and operates utility scale photovoltaic projects, power sold to the grid.

Like many others in these two counties the solar arrays would be installed on land with a Williamson Act contract. Kings and Tulare counties have supported solar use on farmland that is non-prime ag land but now there is push back as we will discuss.

Korean-based SPS is familiar with the vast treeless old lakebed with a portfolio of 130 MW,over 1200 acres near Alpaugh and Allensworth on the edge of lakebed in Tulare County with several projects nearing completion. Most of that acreage had been fallow due to inadequate access to water.

look ma, no trees in an old lakebed – Kansas South project

Also in the old Tulare lakebed but in Kings County near Kettleman City, Westlake Farms is proposing to lease 220 acres to EE Kettleman Land LLC, a San Diego firm who pioneers new solar farms around the state. This would be the third utility-size solar project on Westlake Farms vast acreage in Kings County that sprawls along miles of Highway 41 between Stratford and Kettleman City. One of those projects is Kansas South – under construction now and being developed by Recurrent Energy of San Francisco.

Nearby in Corcoran ,there are 2 new solar farms that are approaching the construction phase says a city report this week .” The first project is located on the 140 +/- acres at the City Well Fields North of town on Nevada Ave. This is supposed to be a 12 MW solar project being put together by EDF Renewable Energy – formerly enXco. They are currently in the permit process having already worked out a purchase contract with PG&E for renewable energy.

At this time they are telling us that their project, which is being built in
conjunction with a second project 20 MW project located on CID property just East of our property, is moving along very quickly for projects of this type.“

SPS also has a 60 megawatt project just outside the Corcoran city limits in conjunction with Corcoran ID, also in Kings County.

And there is more to come. Pacific Gas and Electric Co. agreed to buy electricity from a 100-megawatt solar power plant SunPower Corp. plans to build near NAS Lemoore on the edge of the lake.The Henrietta Solar Project, expected to be b approved by the California Public Utilities Commission would start construction in 2015 SunPower announced recently.

Tulare County lakebed projects

A few miles south in Tulare County, planner Mike Washam says a large share of the 270 MW of power approved by the county Board of Supervisors on farmland to date has been approved in the lakebed near Alpaugh including  another new 20 MW project to be submitted soon that would add up to nearly 200 MW in Tulare County’s arid western edge.

Moratorium?

Not that everyone likes the idea of solar generation on farmland. In Tulare County the Board of Supervisors this week is considering a possible “moratorium” on new solar projects in county. But an alternative proposal expected to have majority support would lay out areas in the county were solar units on farmland would be generally supported including all of the old lakebed area in the se portion of the county.

The new policy would prohibit solar in the 127,000 acre citrus belt, on prime farmland that is not in a city urban boundary(where it is likely to be developed for city uses) as well as Class 1 soils. That would add up to around 870,000 acres in the county that would be off limits to these projects. There are 333,000 acres of trees and vines planted in the county,considered unsuitable for solar, and about 700,000 acres of ‘pasture”.

As of now – there are about 3000 acres of solar projects in the county either built or in the pipeline.

A second stipulation could be added that the proponent must show that the land where the project is proposed lacks an adequate water supply.

Criticism came from the Tulare County Farm Bureau of current policy was heard in this letter submitted this fall.

“Before any further permits are reviewed for solar installations, Farm Bureau would request that Tulare County develops a clear policy on solar installations with regards to prime farm land in Tulare County. We are concerned that the non-prime “case by case” approach is not yet clearly defined for prime farm lands, and we strongly discourage the county from permitting any solar development on lands that can support viable agriculture production.

Farm Bureau does not support the conversion of prime farmland to non-agricultural uses, and we view solar as a development that will displace the agricultural capability of this land and impair its future productivity. We object to solar projects being sited on prime farmland and believe that other marginal or impaired lands exist in the County that is more suitable for this use. If Williamson Act parcels on marginal or impaired grounds do exist and are most preferable for development, we would also ask the county to strongly consider enacting SB 618 law, and place solar easements on those parcels where applicable.“

Westlake Farms owner Ceil Howe doesn’t think much of Farm Bureau’s restrictions  proposed both on the statewide level and by county.”The bottom line is that it’s my property and I’ll do with it what I want.”  As a practical matter, he says ,”water is pretty tight on the Westside” and “solar projects may be the best return a guy can get. ” His farm alone has 12,000 acres fallowed this year.

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