Panoche Valley Solar LLC has teamed with Amec Foster Wheeler PLC, one of the largest contractors in global energy, on plans to build a solar-power plant in San Benito County, where the project’s opponents continue their fight despite a legal judgment against them.
Energy executives expect that an end result of 247 megawatts will generate enough power for Southern California Edison Co. to light up as many as 68,000 households through its electrical infrastructure — covering a population of nearly 14 million people in the bottom half of the state.
Amec Foster Wheeler, a British company, contracts with a number of multinational corporations and federal agencies including Pemex, the United States Department of Homeland Security, ExxonMobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell PLC. In 2013, oil and gas companies supplied more than half of the energy contractor’s pro-forma revenue.
Panoche Valley Solar, a Charlotte company, according to the California Secretary of State, told BenitoLink in an emailed statement March 19 that the solar project could break ground as soon as this summer in a rural area about 30 miles southeast of Hollister. The timeline includes about two years of construction, raising reasonable doubt over whether the project could begin service by year-end next year, when the federal government plans to conclude an investment tax credit of 30 percent for corporate technologies in renewable energy.
Panoche Valley Solar said that the local investment could create as many as 1,000 direct, indirect and induced jobs: Construction calls for 500 direct positions, while the post-completion plan allocates dozens of others.
“Large-scale construction jobs such as the Panoche Valley Solar Project create multiple opportunities for local communities,” said Panoche Valley Solar Vice President Eric Cherniss in a statement to BenitoLink. “Employment by the project, as well as local businesses providing goods and services to it, creates a ripple effect that helps stimulate the local economy. These direct opportunities are on top of the financial benefits received by the county through the forms of sales, use taxes and public benefit compensation, which will help the county better serve its residents.”
Potential benefits, PVS officials say, include $30 million in sales tax, slated to provide more than $8 million for local programs supporting an array of services such as education, public safety and transportation.
Despite such possibilities, however, the project still faces significant hurdles. Environmentalists now point to federal regulators, including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and California Department of Fish and Wildlife, concerning safety and air-quality issues associated with the planned development of the solar facility.
In a telephone interview March 20 with BenitoLink, a spokesperson with the Army Corps of Engineers estimated that the federal agency could require another year or 18 months to complete its review of an environmental impact statement for PVS’s current plan. The spokesperson provided no comment on whether that timeline could affect eligibility for the federal government’s business energy investment tax credit, which will conclude Dec. 31, 2016, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.
A spokesperson with the California Department of Fish and Widlife told BenitoLink March 20 that the state regulator earlier this month received new applications for the project, requesting permits that the developer must have to legally begin construction. The agency also noted that a response by the county related to an environmental review of plans for the project remains outstanding.
“We cannot issue a permit until completion of information required by the California Environmental Quality Act,” said a spokesperson with the Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The state agency said that development of the project additionally requires two regulatory items — an incidental take permit and a lake and streambed alteration agreement — each of which could take months to approve and issue to the developer.
Among critics of the current plan, some claim that potential effects on the surrounding environment could outweigh planned benefits of the project.
Sierra Club Senior Campaign Representative Sarah Friedman told BenitoLink in an interview March 18 that leadership of the environmental organization remains concerned over many of the possible impacts, including regulatory action.
“There is a large number of permits still needed in addition to the county’s environmental impact report, which continues raising questions for regulators over its reliability,” said Friedman. “Because completion of the project would require an expedited timeline to meet the federal business investment tax credit, construction could increase risks of traffic accidents and other accidental harm to threatened and endangered species.”
Friedman said that the location of the project presents risks to rare grasslands considered pivotal for the recovery of species such as the San Joaquin kit fox, blunt-nosed leopard lizard and giant kangaroo rat.
“Sierra Club continues to oppose the Panoche Valley Solar project,” noted Friedman.
Members of the Loma Prieta chapter of the Sierra Club, along with the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society and Save Panoche Valley, filed suit against San Benito County in 2011, when the environmental advocates legally questioned the Board of Supervisors’ approval of an environmental impact report for a previous plan, which proposed 399 megawatts. In the lawsuit, the environmentalists alleged “numerous inadequacies” in analysis of the EIR “were caused by the rush to approve this project in order to qualify it for federal stimulus dollars.”
A county judge ruled against the environmentalists, who subsequently appealed the judgment against them and lost that case, too.
In Sacramento last week, county officials met with other regulators, as well as environmentalists and other stakeholders, and discussed the project.
“We met with the chief consultant of the local government committee, the chief consultant for the utilities and commerce committee and Ken Alex, a senior policy advisor to California Governor Jerry Brown and director of planning and research,” said Supervisor Margie Barrios earlier this week in public session. “We’re hoping that we will see some results.”
Barrios, who chairs the Board of Supervisors, noted that an application filed a year ago was still waiting on regulators in Sacramento, not moving forward there. In public session Tuesday, she said that the county will continue applying pressure to support the development of Panoche Valley Solar’s flagship project.
Information provided by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was added to this story at 3:01 p.m. March 20. Comments by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife were added at 3:19 p.m. March 20.