An alliance of hunters, birdwatchers, and public land advocates in Wisconsin are pushing again towards an enormous photo voltaic mission that’s being proposed in Portage County due to the impacts it might have on larger prairie rooster habitat and native looking alternatives. These teams have stopped in need of making an attempt to dam the mission being proposed by Doral Renewables, which they are saying is crucial in assembly Wisconsin’s long-term renewable power objectives. As an alternative, these teams are asking the state’s regulatory company to scale down the mission in a means that may higher safeguard Wisconsin’s final remaining prairie rooster stronghold. The public comment period for the mission closes Friday.
If accomplished in its present kind, the 7,100-acre Vista Sands Photo voltaic mission could be able to producing round 1,300 megawatts of electrical energy, making it the biggest photo voltaic mission in Wisconsin by far. That’s sufficient to energy roughly 200,000 houses, and it will be a big step towards the state’s bigger objective of reaching net-zero carbon emissions by 2050, Doral’s vice chairman of growth Jon Baker instructed Wisconsin Public Radio in July.
The world the place the Vista Sands mission stands to be constructed is right for huge arrays of photo voltaic panels. It’s a flat, sparsely populated, and principally treeless panorama that’s used predominantly for agriculture. However it’s these similar qualities that additionally make the area one of many final finest locations for larger prairie chickens, a local grouse species that’s listed as threatened in Wisconsin and is on the decline throughout the greater Midwest.
The Buena Vista Wildlife Area covers greater than 12,000 acres close to the proposed growth web site and is residence to two-thirds of the state’s general prairie rooster inhabitants, in response to the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation. The group filed as an intervener within the state’s ongoing approval course of, which is being led by the Public Service Fee.
Photograph by Brandon Jones / USFWS
“It’s handled much like a lawsuit, with testimony, witnesses, and rebuttals. We simply have a vested curiosity on this course of and wish to be engaged on a better stage,” WWF government director Cody Kamrowski tells Out of doors Life. He says it’s the primary time the group has gotten concerned with the PSC. “We filed as an intervener as a result of there wasn’t actually one other conservation group that was going to step as much as the desk and we had been nicely fitted to this place.”
Kamrowski makes it abundantly clear that WWF helps renewable power growth in Wisconsin, and that features the Vista Sands photo voltaic mission. He says the group and its supporters are merely asking the PSC to cut back the scale of the mission by 20 to 30 %. This discount would embody buffers between the big photo voltaic arrays and the neighboring conservation lands that function lekking grounds for prairie chickens. Their concern is that the huge photo voltaic arrays being constructed — together with the accompanying fences, roads, and different infrastructure — will hurt native populations of the birds, which require giant open landscapes to breed and thrive.
Learn Subsequent: Can Wildlife and Clean Energy Coexist in the West?
Though extra analysis is required across the results of renewable power tasks on prairie chickens, past studies have proven that prairie chickens will exit of their approach to keep away from energy traces, roads, and different indicators of human growth. Related conversations are underway within the West concerning renewable energy projects and sage grouse, a species that’s intently associated to prairie chickens that’s additionally extraordinarily delicate to human growth.
“We’ve been getting beat up somewhat bit simply because there are many teams on the market which can be [pushing] renewable power in any respect prices — no matter what the native impacts are,” Kamrowski says. “That’s the actually wonderful line that we’re making an attempt to stroll. We help renewable power and photo voltaic, however we have to be aware of localized wildlife impacts.”
These impacts might (and sure would) lengthen to different species as nicely, he says. The Buena Vista Wildlife space and the encircling public lands in Portage County are residence to loads of whitetails, wild turkeys, and coyotes, all of which give alternatives for native hunters.
Photograph by Jim Hudgins / USFWS
Kamrowski clarifies that the present proposal for Vista Sands doesn’t embody constructing on public land, and the vast majority of acreage slated for growth is privately owned agricultural lands. (Beneath the present framework, farmers are providing their acreage to Doral as a part of a profitable 25-year lease.) Lots of the giant photo voltaic arrays, nonetheless, could be constructed on acreage that abuts the scatter work of conservation lands in Portage County the place prairie chickens and different critters are recognized to dwell.
Kamrowski voices two major issues with such an association: Along with reducing off migration routes and pushing out wild birds and critters, Kamrowski worries sportsmen and -women is likely to be much less more likely to hunt amongst sprawling arrays of photo voltaic panels.
“In hunter security, they train you to know your goal and past, and if there are buildings round as a substitute of open farm fields, folks aren’t going to be taking pictures in that course,” Kamrowski explains. “So it does devalue the leisure worth of that property to a point.”
Hunters aren’t alone in pushing again on the scale and scale of the photo voltaic mission, both. Kamrowski says WWF has been supported as intervener by different conservation nonprofits such because the Dane County Conservation League and the Wisconsin Society for Ornithology — each of which have acquired and labored to guard among the finest remaining prairie rooster habitat in and across the Buena Vista Wildlife Space.
“That’s what’s actually highly effective about all this. You’ve acquired looking teams, and then you definately’ve acquired non-consumptive birdwatching teams concerned. That actually speaks to the significance of this and the uniform message that everyone has.”
What’s Subsequent for the Undertaking
In July the Wisconsin Division of Pure Assets launched an Environmental Impact Statement for the Vista Sands Photo voltaic mission. The DNR decided that the mission, as presently proposed, might negatively influence the native prairie rooster inhabitants, and it gave suggestions for a way the PSC ought to transfer ahead on approval.
The DNR’s major suggestion is to take away 10 of the proposed major areas for photo voltaic arrays together with 4 alternate websites. The company additionally asks regulators to contemplate alternate areas that will be much less impactful to wildlife, because the firm is presently leasing an extra 2,900 acres within the county that’s not included in its present mission footprint.
Learn Subsequent: The Toughest Grouse Hunts are Always Worth It
Kamrowski says the DNR’s suggestion lined up properly with WWF’s personal request to cut back the mission’s footprint by round 20 to 30 % and set up a buffer zone between the photo voltaic arrays and their related infrastructure and neighboring conservation lands.
“We ended up doing a GIS evaluation, and [the two] suggestions truly aligned completely … the DNR simply did [their analysis] by photo voltaic arrays and never by miles,” Kamrowski says. “So we’ve simply stated we’re going to undertake the DNR’s suggestion simply to maintain it constant between the 2.”
Kamrowski says the PSC has till January 2025 to decide on the Vista Sands mission. The company is presently accepting public touch upon the mission, however that window closes Friday. (Click here to remark.) He says there’s already been a flood of feedback, however he hopes that extra hunters will communicate up and specific their help for the DNR’s suggestion to scale down the mission.
“It’s all about wildlife-responsible renewable power siting,” Kamrowski says. “And I feel we are able to discover that balancing act.”
