By SCOTT MERZBACH
SHUTESBURY — A lengthy permitting process for a six-megawatt solar array proposed for 31 acres of forest on Pratt Corner Road could end next week.
The Planning Board is scheduled to meet at 7:15 p.m. Monday at the Shutesbury Town Hall to continue a public hearing which began last July. Lake Street Partners LLC of Chicago is seeking a special permit to convert what is known as the Wheelock Tract, owned by W.D. Cowls Inc. of Amherst, into a renewable energy site.
Marnin Lebovits, managing director co-founder of Lake Street, said he is confident that the company will get approval after making a series of changes requested by the Planning Board.
“We still think this will be a 2016 project,” Lebovits said in a telephone interview Wednesday.
These changes include removing the photovoltaics from sloped areas on the site and placing some of the panels in different areas to minimize the impact on wetlands, Lebovits said.
“We decided we’ll work with the Planning Board and give them what they asked for,” Lebovits said. “It’s time to cut to the chase, and we have been fine in accommodating the Planning Board.”
Throughout the process, a community group known as the Alliance for Appropriate Development has kept a close eye on the project, raising concerns about clear-cutting the land, the scale of such a facility in a residential neighborhood and how water flow to the Atkins Reservoir, which is one of the main drinking water supplies for the town of Amherst, might be affected.
Miriam DeFant, a member of the alliance, said in an email that there have continuing concerns about the project design and whether it meets stormwater management requirements.
“The project has undergone several redesigns due to multiple shortcomings identified by the Planning Board, Conservation Commission, third party reviewers and residents,” DeFant said.
She added that it is not certain that the most recent revision, released Friday, adequately addresses all concerns raised.
Lebovits said his company already has an agreement to tie power generated from the site into a nearby National Grid substation. That proximity, along with the site’s distance from nearby homes and the road, made it a logical place to put the project, he said.
Lake Street has a similar large-scale solar project permitted for installation in East Deerfield, and others operating in Billerica, Lancaster and Oxford.