APC: Companies request delay on Rainbow Trout Solar Project zoning vote
Companies behind controversial 1,700-acre solar project in western Tippecanoe County ask to push pivotal vote, scheduled for next week, to August
The companies behind the Rainbow Trout Solar Project – a 1,700-acre plan in western Tippecanoe County that has met with pushback from nearby resident and has prompted the county to rethink it zoning codes for large-scale solar work – have asked to postpone a pivotal Board of Zoning Appeals hearing, initially scheduled for next week.
A request for a special zoning exception for the Rainbow Trout Solar Project was pushed back to Aug. 27, at the companies’ request, Area Plan Commission staff reported Wednesday afternoon.
The hearing had been scheduled for Wednesday, June 25.
Company officials did not immediately respond Wednesday about why they asked for the delay.
Geenex and RWE Clean Energy filed for the special exception in May for a 120-megawatt project that covers miles of land from just north of Division Road to Jackson Highway in Montmorenci. According to the application, property leases for the solar project would cover 1,791 acres, coming from six property owners. Of that, 1,051 acres are considered buildable and are anticipated to be used for the solar array and associated infrastructure, according to the application. The rest of the land will be used for required setbacks, buffers and environmental preservation, according to the application. Construction would start in 2026, with commercial operation starting in 2027, according to the application, with the project lasting an anticipated 35 years.
Earlier this week, Tippecanoe County commissioners gave final approval to a one-year moratorium on additional, large-scale solar projects, hoping to revisit zoning codes written in 2021.
But commissioners said the moratorium did not stand in the way of the Rainbow Trout Solar Project, which filed for a special zoning exception it needed before the county initiated the moratorium. The zoning codes written four years ago allow large-scale solar projects on agricultural land, provided the BZA approves a special exception, based on a project’s decommissioning plan and other factors.
The meeting Monday turned into a preview of the Board of Zoning Appeals hearing, with residents laying out concerns about the project near their homes, including about decommissioning plans, drainage and assorted environmental issues.
For more on the project and the questions swirling around it, see below for an account from Monday’s Based in Lafayette.
What’s next
Geenex and RWE will host an open house to discuss the Rainbow Trout Solar Project from noon-2 p.m. Monday, June 23, at the TCHA History Center, 522 Columbia St. in Lafayette.
The Area Board of Zoning Appeals is now scheduled to consider a special zoning exception for the Rainbow Trout Solar Project at 6 p.m. Aug. 27 at the County Office Building, 20 N. Third St. in Lafayette.
The following story appeared in a Monday, June 16, edition of Based in Lafayette.
SOLAR MORATORIUM VOTE TURNS INTO PREVIEW OF HEARING COMING ON WESTERN TIPPECANOE CO. PROJECT
A one-year moratorium on large-scale solar projects, finalized Monday morning by Tippecanoe County commissioners, won’t necessarily put the brakes on a 1,700-acre proposal in the western part of the county, heading for a pivotal hearing next week.
Commissioners made that clear Monday, as they paused any other projects in the works to give the county time to assemble a committee to determine what, if any, changes the county’s zoning policy – created just four years ago – needs.
“People are right, things have changed a lot since we passed the solar ordinance in 2021,” Commissioner Tom Murtaugh said after Monday’s vote. “It’s clear that it just makes sense for us to slow down and take another look.”
Commissioner David Byers has said that the county knows of several other solar projects being assembled in other parts of the county.
Monday’s hearing on the moratorium played out as a preview for June 25, though, when Geenex Power and RWE Clean Energy’s Rainbow Trout Solar Project, situated in two sections spread between Division Road and Montmorenci, is scheduled for an Area Board of Zoning hearing for a special zoning exception needed to advance what’s turned into a controversial plan.
The commissioners’ meeting room was standing room only, dominated by neighbors in red and peppered in shades of teal that Geenex officials had advertised for supporters to wear.
Residents who have been rallying for months to find cracks in the Rainbow Trout Solar Project’s filings and plans that could derail it – whether at the BZA stage next week or regulatory steps that would come later about drainage and other infrastructure requirements – came at Geenex and RWE as two-faced. That was particularly so after media reports that detailed the companies’ hopes of working with neighbors to refigure plans as necessary to make residents comfortable, followed by publicized efforts to stand against the county’s proposed moratorium.
Carrie Ehresman, who lives on Kerber Road near the southern portion of the Rainbow Trout project, told commissioners that despite Geenex touting being in the community since the early 2020s, the company held a single public information session in mid-March.
“Multiple direct neighbors to the project voiced concerns, and virtually none of those concerns have been addressed,” Ehresman said. “There were vague promises for a future large meeting, but no subsequent community meeting was ever held. The vast majority of immediate neighbors to this project were only asked for input after Rainbow Trout had filed with the BZA … on May 16.”
Ehresman said she received a letter with her first formal notice of the project postmarked May 17. She told commissioners when residents attempted to follow up with company officials, “the response was noncommittal.”
“This is not the behavior of a developer that truly cares about the neighbors or wants to adapt the project to address our concerns,” Ehresman said. “Instead, you have a company out soliciting support from folks who know little to nothing about this project, while simultaneously ignoring and actively working against those who live nearby and care.”
Nearly a dozen neighbors spoke Monday morning, most aiming at the Rainbow Trout project, at federal subsidies for utility-scale solar energy projects and questions about what the county might end up with over the 35-year lifespan proposed. They were countered by several who suggested that neighbors were missing a larger picture about gaining a source of alternative energy while wrapped up in questions about aesthetics in their part of the county.
Geenex representatives for the most part sat tight for a hearing that pushed past an hour.
Ryan Munden, a Lafayette attorney representing the Rainbow Trout project, said the companies received the assurances they were looking for early in the meeting, when county attorney Doug Masson confirmed that the moratorium would not impact a project already filed for approval.
“It’s not really a question,” Munden said. Two weeks earlier, when commissioners took the first of two required votes on the measure, Munden had asked them if the moratorium was intended as a way to stop the project.
“Our legal position is we have vested rights,” Munden said. “But we wanted confirmation of that at the last meeting. … They answered that today.”
Shelby Ruffner, manager of project development with Geenex Power, said the companies have scheduled a public information session from noon to 2 p.m. Monday, June 23, at the Tippecanoe County Historical Association’s History Center, 522 Columbia St. in Lafayette. That’s two days before the BZA hearing.
“It’s just another opportunity to share more information about the project,” Ruffner said. “It seems that there’s a lot of information that hasn’t been (absorbed), so just another opportunity to do that.”
“There’s been a lot of information shared,” Munden said. “What’s concerning or frustrating is that we hear comments in these meetings, but we submitted a 900-page application that I get the impression the vast majority of people in there haven’t bothered to look through. … To the extent there's questions, let's ask it in a nonadversarial forum and provide information, because these meetings can get hot under the collar.”
Is it beyond that point of being able to bridge what Geenex and RWE want to get done and what neighbors say they’re unwilling to accept without a fight?
“We don't want to have confrontation, but we're always open to conversation,” Ruffner said.
The county’s current zoning code requires solar companies to lay out a decommissioning plan as part of its special exception request. It also requires large-scale solar energy systems to be set back 50 feet from property lines of nonparticipating land; solar panels and mounting systems that are at least 36 inches of the ground; the project would need to be surrounded by fencing at least six feet tall; it would have to include stormwater plans, and would need to be planted with noninvasive, pollinator-friendly mixes and native plants. The county’s rules also require a power purchase agreement for the energy produced from a solar project.
Residents have argued that Geenex and RWE’s application comes up short on several accounts, including on provisions for where the power will go. Earlier this month, as the Area Plan Commission’s executive committee agreed with the planning staff’s analysis that the request “will not substantially adversely affect” the county’s comprehensive land use plan, an attorney for the neighboring residents hinted that legal action could follow.
Murtaugh said commissioners would assign the Area Plan Commission to review the county’s large-scale, lining up a committee for input from residents, including those with expertise. He said suggestions made by residents in recent meetings about what other counties had done with regulations dealing with setbacks and buffer yards separating panels from neighboring properties, getting assurances on liability assurances from companies and decommissioning commitments would be things to look into.
“We have a year,” Murtaugh said. “We’re reaching out to some people. We’ve told people that, obviously, it can’t be all opposition folks. We have a lot of expertise over at Purdue that we’ll look to bring in. … We have some work to do.”
About the solar moratorium: The moratorium, according to the ordinance approved Monday, is aimed at large-scale solar energy systems, defined as “a ground-mounted solar energy system, on tracts equal to or more than 10 acres, for the purpose of generating photovoltaic power with the primary purpose of selling wholesale or retail generated electricity.” The moratorium would not target solar panels on rooftops or attached to buildings. The measure comes after community concerns “as to the adequacy of the protections and restrictions available for the development of large-scale solar energy systems in the county,” according to stated reasons in the ordinance. Among those: the impact of construction on the local roads and infrastructure; “the impact of solar panels on drainage, runoff and other health and environmental consequences;” what large-scale operations will have on agricultural capacity in the county; and how adequate the plans are for decommissioning once a solar project pulls out.
About the proposed Rainbow Trout Solar Project: Geenex and RWE Clean Energy filed for the special exception in May for a 120-megawatt project that covers miles of land from just north of Division Road to Jackson Highway in Montmorenci. According to the application, property leases for the solar project would cover 1,791 acres, coming from six property owners. Of that, 1,051 acres are considered buildable and are anticipated to be used for the solar array and associated infrastructure, according to the application. The rest of the land will be used for required setbacks, buffers and environmental preservation, according to the application. Construction would start in 2026, with commercial operation starting in 2027, according to the application, with the project lasting an anticipated 35 years.
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