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OLIVIA — Brothers Larry Rauenhorst and Rolly Rauenhorst believe the future belongs to electrification, and their conviction goes well beyond the vehicles driven on roadways.
It goes all the way to the Renville County farm field that Larry Rauenhorst, now retired from farming, rents to an active farmer. The two brothers installed 10 towers standing 12 feet above the ground. The towers are dispersed from each other and hold a total of 80 solar electric generation panels.
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The brothers are working with the University of Minnesota Morris to examine the feasibility of solar generation in farm operations. The towers are tall enough to allow crops to grow under them and combines and tractors to work around them.
The University will help measure crop loss resulting from the shade cast by the elevated panels, as well as the value of the electricity they generate for the farming operations. The panels feed power to an on-site charging station for an electric tractor that will be used for seeding, tilling and harvesting the crops raised in the field.
The brothers want to connect the 37-kilowatt capacity system to the Renville-Sibley Cooperative Power Association lines that serve a business across from the field and other neighboring farm places. Their plan is to feed excess power to the grid as allowed by Minnesota’s net metering law.
The law requires utilities to pay the renewable energy generator at its average retail rate for the electricity. To qualify for the retail rate, the self-generation must be under 40 kilowatts.
The brothers and the small electric cooperative, with 1,564 members, are now locked in a dispute that extends beyond the farm field. It is headed to the district court and to St. Paul.
The brothers said Larry Rauenhorst signed interconnection agreements with the cooperative twice to produce power at the farm field, which previously did not have electric service but is located in the cooperative’s service territory. Each agreement was canceled by the cooperative, they said.
Larry Rauenhorst filed a complaint with the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission asking it to direct the cooperative to allow him to connect the system and to pay him at the retail rate for the power it produces. The PUC will first decide whether it has jurisdiction to hear the complaint.
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Rauenhorst also filed a complaint in District Court in Renville County seeking a judge’s order to compel the cooperative to pay the retail rate for electricity produced by the system.
The cooperative told the Rauenhorsts it would not compensate them for the excess power generated by the panels at the retail rate. It offered instead to provide compensation at a lower rate based on the costs for power on the wholesale market.
The cooperative also informed the brothers that, to resolve the dispute, they would need to follow the cooperative’s bylaws, which require arbitration.
The cooperative says that the Public Utilities Commission lacks jurisdiction and should not hear the complaint. Rural cooperatives are not regulated by the PUC, it pointed out. It has responded similarly to the civil lawsuit, claiming that this dispute should be resolved by the arbitration requirement in its bylaws.
Rolly Rauenhorst said the cooperative’s refusal to pay the retail rate represents a “clear violation” of Minnesota’s net metering law, and they should not have to go to mediation or arbitration.
The cooperative says it is not obligated to pay the retail rate because it does not believe the system installed in a farm field meets the spirit of the net metering law, Renville-Sibley Cooperative CEO DeeAnn Norris told the brothers in a letter, as well as in a response filed with the Public Utilities Commission. The system does not serve a house, farm or business that would exist regardless of the presence of renewable energy. It does not offset the power that they would otherwise purchase, she stated.
The cooperative’s CEO argues that paying the retail rate imposes a significant cost burden on the other members of the cooperative and is unfair to them.
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“Compensation structures that require the cooperative to pay retail rates for energy generated in an empty field that did not have a pre-existing service result in costs that are unfairly shared by all members,” Norris stated in an email to the West Central Tribune.
The CEO pointed out that the cooperative is one of the smallest of the rural cooperatives in the state. Its operating margins are small: It showed net operating revenues of under $54,000 in 2024 and under $30,000 in 2025.
Norris said the cooperative has worked with the Rauenhorsts and answered their questions about the unique system since 2022. It has offered to resolve the dispute through the cooperative’s resolution process, in place since 2018, and to pay 90% of the mediation or arbitration costs, according to Norris.
The CEO also maintains that the cooperative supports renewable energy and has worked with many of its members to interconnect solar and other distributed-generation projects.
The Rauenhorsts charge that the cooperative only recently added an arbitration requirement in place of mediation.
The Rauenhorsts estimate that, at this point, they have missed out on generating $12,000 worth of electricity because the system is not connected to the grid. They said they invested more than $80,000 in the equipment and performed much of the installation work. Larry Rauenhorst assembled a hammer with 300,000 pounds of thrust to drive the poles holding the solar panels 12 feet into the ground.
If they were to receive the retail rate for the electricity, they estimate the system could pay for itself in six to eight years. Being able to qualify for the net metering revenues was important to their decision to go forward with the project, they said.
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“As farmers, you don’t want to just spend money and throw it away. You want to have a return on what you’re doing,” Rolly Rauenhorst told the West Central Tribune.
The brothers worked with Minnesota Renewable Energy Incorporated of Glencoe to install the system. Company president Aaron Busse said he has assisted with more than 500 interconnection agreements between self-generation systems and utilities. He’s never had a utility refuse to pay the retail rate.
Busse stated in a letter to the Public Utilities Commission that the brothers met with the cooperative early in the design phase to ensure they were following all steps correctly. He said they were “ambushed” by board members and cooperative representatives who showed up and told the brothers they could not build the project.
Net metering has been the law in Minnesota since 1981 and has been the foundation of the state’s renewable energy industry, according to Busse. He is among a number of renewable-energy advocates who have filed briefs with the PUC in support of the brothers.
The Minnesota Rural Electric Association is among the organizations that have filed briefs in support of the local cooperative. It represents the 50 rural electric cooperatives in the state.
At this point, many of the initial filings with the Public Utilities Commission focus on whether it has jurisdiction to hear the dispute. The Renville-Sibley Cooperative, like other rural cooperatives, has adopted bylaws that it argues exempt it from state regulation that applies to larger, investor-owned utilities. Rural cooperatives are governed by democratically elected boards, the co-op explains, citing a state statute that exempts rural cooperatives and municipal utilities from regulation.
Those arguing for the Public Utilities Commission to hear the case state that it does have jurisdiction. The PUC cannot regulate the electric rates cooperatives charge, but it has authority over their policies, they state. They also contend in their briefs that since the cooperative imposed a requirement for arbitration in its bylaws, it lost its immunity from state regulation.
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Rolly Rauenhorst has attended informational meetings hosted by the cooperative, and he tells other members there of the dispute. At one meeting, the cooperative showed a video produced for Twin Cities Public Television’s “Almanac” program that highlights the brothers’ idea of producing electricity in farm fields, instead of displacing farm land with solar panels.
“I don’t see a compromise,” said Rolly Rauenhorst when asked if he would be open to one to resolve the dispute. “What is there? They either pay the retail rate or not. The law is clear.”
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