STOCKTON, Ala. (WALA) – State legislators from the Gulf Coast have introduced bills that could temporarily halt a Stockton solar facility as Silicon Ranch, the company that wants to build a solar farm on the Stockton property, scheduled a meeting with citizens opposing the development.
State Sen. Greg Albritton and State Rep. Matt Simpson introduced complimentary bills that if passed, could temporarily stop the Stockton facility or any other solar site from moving forward. One bill would give county commissioners in Mobile and Baldwin counties regulatory control over future solar facilities built in their jurisdictions. The other bill would impose a one-year moratorium on new solar farm development.
Albritton said the moratorium would provide time to examine potential environmental impacts and create new parameters for solar site developers to follow.
“What we need to look at during that moratorium is we could take a look at the process and find out what’s going on,” Albritton said. “How did this happen in the first place and how can we prevent that from occurring in this vacuum and how can we get more transparency?”
Property rights at center of debate
The immediate challenge will be to convince other lawmakers across the state to support the legislation quickly. At the core of the fight is property rights and what can be done on unzoned private land. Alabama has put itself atop the list of industrial development leaders in the country.
“I’m certain that those questions will come up and I hope that those are done openly on the floor so that we can discuss them openly because that does affect all of Alabama and we need to address it, but just because it needs to be discussed does not mean that they need to have free reign,” Albritton said.
Silicon Ranch to hold public meeting
Nashville-based Silicon Ranch operates in 18 states and Canada. The company has faced community opposition before and will meet with the community Wednesday, April 8, in Bay Minette where they said they will address misinformation surrounding the project.
“One of the big points of misinformation is that we will be building in or damaging wetlands,” said Reagan Farr, co-founder and CEO of Silicon Ranch. “That is not true. The project is actually protecting wetlands. There’s eight hundred acres of wetlands onsite and we have set aside twenty-five hundred acres, all of which includes those wetlands and buffers around those wetlands.”
Representatives from the Alabama-based company that manufactures the solar panels will also attend to speak to their track record.
Farr said his company has a $350 million contract with Alabama Power to provide electricity and he intends to meet that obligation. He said he has seen this kind of opposition before but did not expect to run into it in Alabama.
“I expect this when I’m in Berkley, California,” Farr said. “I don’t expect it in Alabama and I sure don’t expect it from Republicans, so I would say that I am flabbergasted and do not understand, other than trying to curry favor with this Facebook group what they are defending or what they are trying to achieve. Very anti-business. Very anti individual rights and property rights with no justification.”
Farr said his company has already met with legislators in Montgomery and he is confident Albritton’s and Simpson’s bills will fail.
The public meeting is set for Wednesday, April 8 at 6:30 p.m. at the John R. Rhodes Civic Center adjacent to City Hall. The company encouraged people to visit the Stockton Solar Farm page on Silicon Ranch’s website to give feedback. Farr will give a presentation and answer questions from the community.
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