Forestry specialists query Michigan DNR’s plan to chop state land for photo voltaic

GAYLORD, MI – Forestry specialists and environmental advocates are questioning Michigan officers’ determination to lease 420 acres of state forestland close to Gaylord for photo voltaic improvement.

It’s not the precise leasing of state land that bothers them, although. It’s which 420 acres they selected.

Management on the Michigan Division of Pure Sources printed a public discover on Tuesday, Jan. 7, concerning the proposed photo voltaic lease on state land that included a property description. A remark interval and public listening to is predicted to be scheduled concerning the land use choice after an outcry of concern from state lawmakers.

The state land in query in Otsego County’s Hayes Township is straight away west of a big and long-running scrapyard alongside Milbocker Street. There’s a high-voltage transmission line bisecting it that connects to a close-by energy substation. Maps present there are 4 present oil and fuel wells there, too.

A lot of the acreage in query can be densely forested with purple and different pine tree species, perhaps masking half the property. There’s a filth highway that runs by the middle of the tract and a public entry level alongside the southern boundary – the Pine Baron Pathway frequented by cross-country skiers in winter.

Forestry specialists and environmental advocates are actually elevating considerations.

Lisha Ramsdell, affiliate director of Gaylord-based conservation group Huron Pines, stated the group applauds the state’s willpower to guard Michigan’s air and ambiance and combat local weather change with renewable vitality. The difficulty comes if officers don’t select the appropriate locations for improvement, she stated.

“The extra analysis I do on deforestation for the sake of photo voltaic, particularly as you begin to scale that up, and for 1000’s of acres, that appears actually brief sighted,” Ramsdell stated.

She additionally questioned whether or not this proposed deforestation for photo voltaic vitality and related lack of carbon sequestration capability could be tallied by accreditors as a carbon “leakage” to the state’s forest carbon credit score mission within the Pigeon River Nation State Forest 20 miles away.

DNR officers have stated the company intends to lease 4,000 acres of state-managed public belief land statewide for photo voltaic improvement to assist buildout renewable vitality assets and lift departmental revenues.

“Shedding the timber is one factor, however you’re dropping that biodiversity. You’re dropping the habitat connectivity as properly,” Ramsdell stated.

“And as you begin to scale these as much as into the 1000’s of acres, there’s potential compromise to our water assets, groundwater recharge areas. Our forest and our soil present that filter system for our groundwater. And so these are all actually necessary components to be thought-about as properly.”

Otsego County is thought for its excessive elevation that positions it because the headwaters for 5 main up north streams, the AuSable, Black, Manistee, Pigeon and Sturgeon rivers.

Ramsdell argued brownfields, fallow fields, and even farmland now getting used to develop corn for ethanol could be higher decisions for photo voltaic improvement over clear-cutting public forest.

And he or she isn’t the one one who feels that approach.

Retired Michigan State College forestry professor Larry Leefers stated that he and different members of the Society of American Foresters took a eager curiosity on this subject as quickly because the information broke final week. He stated many members are reacting with dismay and writing to their lawmakers.

“This proposal to chop down a residing forest that’s sequestering carbon and exchange it with photo voltaic arrays simply doesn’t observe very properly with the way in which we handle for sustainability,” Leefers stated.

“Whereas we’d be actually supportive of renewable vitality – whether or not it’s photo voltaic or wind or wooden or water – we’d suppose that there could be higher locations to do that form of factor. As a result of there could be the lack of a whole lot of acres of habitat for wildlife and the opposite many advantages that forests give associated to water, soil and wooden merchandise.

“This simply doesn’t look like a really applicable use of state forest land,” Leefers stated.

But different environmental advocates say this photo voltaic proposal shouldn’t be a black and white subject. That the DNR’s determination could very properly be a great one.

Charlotte Jameson, coverage specialist with the nonprofit Michigan Environmental Council, stated she sees lots of the reason why placing photo voltaic on this land could also be a web profit to the surroundings.

“Our positioning is that this may very well be a very good mission, however let’s see the evaluation. Let’s see extra of that data when it comes to the ecological and local weather profit,” Jameson stated.

“Let’s undergo the stakeholder course of the place we develop and form the plan in order that we’re mitigating any unintended penalties, proper?”

The DNR is treating land leases for photo voltaic improvement equally to timber leases. There’s a public discover of the intent to lease, however no remark interval or public listening to except sufficient individuals make that request.

Nonprofit group Michigan United Conservation Golf equipment (MUCC) despatched a letter concerning the photo voltaic plan in Gaylord to DNR Director Scott Bowen to criticize the choice. The group argued the DNR should be extra clear about standards to pick out state land for photo voltaic leases and halt all such leasing exercise till they achieve this.

The conservation nonprofit stated it doesn’t instantly reject all new photo voltaic siting proposals, however such initiatives ought to solely be authorized on “lands which are ill-suited for different makes use of, solely after public evaluation and scrutiny on the method of website choice, and with a tandem land acquisition to recoup the misplaced acreage,” the letter stated.

Revenues from photo voltaic leasing also needs to go into one of many state’s constitutionally protected funds to enhance Michigan’s habitats and recreation, MUCC argued in its letter.

In an interview with MLive final week, DNR Director of Public Lands Scott Whitcomb stated the state acreage close to Gaylord in query is taken into account “marginal” due to the prevailing oil and fuel wells and the high-voltage transmission line that runs by the tract. Two close by photo voltaic initiatives on personal land are additionally already within the works, whereas among the website’s timber was beforehand harvested and replanted with purple pine seedlings, he stated.

“The company checked out all of it altogether and stated, ‘We expect we will mitigate for the disturbance that we’re going to have right here,’” Whitcomb stated. “That’s a possibility the place we predict that photo voltaic improvement could be the most effective use of that land.”

Whitcomb stated the intention is for the DNR to purchase an acre of land elsewhere for each acre devoted to photo voltaic arrays. These alternative lands may then offset the misplaced wildlife habitat, carbon sink and public entry at these photo voltaic farms.

In the meantime, DNR officers are pursuing a photo voltaic mission on an outdated iron mine tailings website within the Higher Peninsula’s Dickinson County, aiming to interrupt floor in 2027. Additionally they labored towards placing photo voltaic arrays on an outdated sand and gravel mine in Crawford County, however that mission fell aside.