Linn County supervisors extend solar moratorium for final time

CEDAR RAPIDS — The Linn County Board of Supervisors extended a pause Monday in accepting new applications for utility-scale solar installations through Sept. 30 for the last time before the three-member board adopts new code governing the projects.

The supervisors unanimously voted to extend the moratorium, which was set to end June 30, as staff prepare new code language based on the work of renewable energy review committees, who met earlier this year to make recommendations.

Any changes would not apply to previously approved projects. Last year, the supervisors approved three controversial utility-grade solar installations — one near Coggon and two related ones near Palo.

The 640-acre site near Coggon is developed by Idaho-based Clenera and the Central Iowa Power Cooperative. There also is a total of over 1,000 acres for two projects from NextEra near the decommissioned Duane Arnold Energy Center nuclear plant near Palo.

In their first public discussion in May of four review committees’ recommended code changes, supervisors emphasized their desire to see strong language particularly surrounding the long-term operations of solar installations.

Overall, policy changes in four areas were considered: good neighbor practices, battery energy storage systems, life cycle costs and balancing agriculture and solar.

County Planning and Development Director Charlie Nichols said a summary of that discussion is in the supervisors’ mailboxes. Once they give feedback, that summary will be posted on the county website. New code will be written based on that discussion.

By Sept. 30, Nichols said he anticipates the supervisors will be done or nearly done discussing the ordinance and completing the three considerations required to change the policy.

Supervisor Ben Rogers said the moratorium is a mechanism not to delay a project but to ensure that no potential applicant can submit an application that would be subject to the standards of the previous ordinance.

Through this process of reviewing ordinance language, Rogers said, the county has learned better practices that will guide efforts to craft the final policy.

“We want to have an ordinance that achieves as close to a win for whatever side of the discussion you’re on,” Rogers said.

Nichols said the county may not need a full three months to get new code written. When the supervisors first passed a moratorium nine months ago, the board wanted to approve pauses in three-month blocks.

The majority of this time will be taken for the ordinance to go through government meetings and the public process. For instance, Nichols said, if the ordinance is ready by Aug. 1, it would go to the county Planning and Zoning Commission on the third Monday of the month and then go to the supervisors for its three considerations.

Supervisor Kirsten Running-Marquardt said she would like to see this move as fast as possible while making sure the county is doing its due diligence to get it right. She suggested taking parts of the policy to the Planning and Zoning Commission as they’re ready to get discussions started in July, which Nichols supported.

She and Rogers indicated they would not support further extensions of the moratorium.

“It’s not easy but working toward what’s best for Linn County including all the decommissioning, including the battery storage, including all that information is really important that we get it right,” Running-Marquardt said. “I know there are other counties that are looking to us to do what we do.”

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