BERNARDSTON — A proposal for a new solar farm has Planning Board members concerned about how the solar panels might affect Bernardston’s flooding problem.
The solar farm is planned to take 23.8 acres of the Grover family’s farm at 32 Fox Hill Road, behind Antonio’s II and the Four Leaf Clover restaurant.
Rena Grover said the family decided with the 105-year-old dairy farm struggling, using the land for a solar farm would be “the most sustainable way to keep the farm going.” The Grovers plan to lease a portion of their land to the Clean Energy Collective, a company based in Colorado with offices in Worcester, that builds and manages solar farms.
Close to 20 residents came to a meeting Thursday night where the Planning Board opened its public hearing on the project. Also present were representatives from the Clean Energy Collective and its subcontracted design company Land Tech.
Installation of the panels would involve no excavation, explained Matt Waterman of Land Tech. Instead, the panels are driven directly into the ground, so they can be removed without permanently altering the environment.
The field of solar panels would be 460 feet from its abutters to the north on Fox Hill Road, 120 feet from its abutters to the east on Route 5, 266 feet from its abutters to the west, and 105 feet from its abutters to the south. The only noise from the power plant would come from machinery at the middle of the land plot, which the Land Tech representatives said would not be audible from outside the fenced-in area.
The energy generated will not only provide power for the Grovers’ farm, but will go to the power grid Eversource supplies. Residents will be able to “buy in” to the solar farm for a discount on their electricity bills.
Clean Energy Collective Director of Project Development Giuseppe Perniciaro likened the setup to a pond with multiple streams feeding into it: “You don’t know if it came from this stream or that stream. It’s very similar to electricity. … Electrons just get used where they’re first available.”
If Perniciaro was using ponds and streams to illustrate a point, the Planning Board, however, raised realistic concerns about water, particularly how the panels would affect the flow of water from the hills west of Route 5 into the wetlands of central Bernardston.
Board member John Lepore said he had “a real concern” that the solar panels would make the surface of the ground less permeable to water, so that in a rainstorm more water would run down the hill into central Bernardston, potentially causing even worse floods than the town has previously dealt with.
The plans for the solar farm include drainage basins, which Waterman said could be expanded and complemented with other designs that would slow water drainage.
“We can’t design for the 500-year storm … but we can design (prevention) measures,” Waterman said.
“The project may actually represent a way to improve (the problem),” said Conservation Commissioner Bill Meese. The solar farm project is also under review by the Conservation Commission.
Meese said the technical issues involved in the project are beyond the abilities of the Conservation Commission, and it will be necessary for the commission and the Planning Board to consult experts.
Residents also raised concerns about the appearance of the solar farm, which Planning Board Chairwoman Chris Wysk sought to address.
“What we’re trying to achieve here is, if this project does get approved, that the visual aspect of it will be minimized,” Wysk said. “We’re all stakeholders in this, the whole town really, not just the Grovers. This is our community, this is where everybody lives, and we want to make sure that the project is done tastefully and that everyone ends up being happy about it.”
The Planning Board requested mockup images from the Clean Energy Collective of what the solar panels would look like from different vantage points in town. Those images will be taken into account as the Planning Board continues its review process.
The Planning Board will continue its public hearing Aug. 16. The project will also be discussed at the Conservation Commission meeting on Tuesday.
“We really will take into account all the different aspects of what we heard tonight and we will work on them the best we can,” Perniciaro said. “We guarantee that. That’s why we have made a good reputation for ourselves in Massachusetts.”
Contact Max Marcus at
mmarcus@recorder.com
or 413-772-0261 ext. 261.