Responds to recent editorial
To the editor:
A response to your editorial printed Friday, January 20, 2023 titled ‘Not in My Backyard’ Approach Hypocritical is warranted because the facts about industrial-sized solar projects being proposed in Ohio need to be provided to the good citizens of Columbiana County. This is especially important because one such project is proposed for Franklin Township, namely Kensington PV I, LLC.
The first inspiring quote from the editorial was, “Those who were worried about preserving “agricultural character,” were less worried about the actual farmers.” Somehow, the editor has a completely incorrect understanding of who the farmers are. The so-called activists that are opposing these projects are farmers. Farmers do not want these industrial solar projects beside their farms and, perhaps even more importantly, do not want industrial projects using up farmland, a shrinking commodity in our state and nation. The people leasing out their farms to solar companies will no longer have land to farm. They are no longer farmers.
In the case of the proposed Kensington Solar project, the 353,684 panels will cover 2,264 acres of farmland (about 1/6th of our township or the equivalent of 856 football fields). This land will have 39 miles of 7′ tall woven wire fence topped with barbed wire. There will be 42,801 panel support I-beams driven 6′ to 11′ deep into formerly fertile, food-producing soil. Many of these fence posts and I-beams will need to be cemented into the ground. The posts will undoubtedly damage field drainage tile; this will cause sinkholes and redirect water flow onto neighboring yards and fields. Our land is hilly, so what happens on one person’s property flows to the neighboring property. Decommissioning these posts will cause settlement holes and rocky shale to shift to the top. We have witnessed this during the solar company’s post-driving practice run on this Franklin Township property.
So, I contend, no real farmer would let an industrial solar project do this to the land that their generational farm families have nurtured for so many years. And the solar companies are not done with the destruction. They will also need 37 miles of access roads within the project. This requires 3,000 truckloads of topsoil to be removed and replaced with 3,000 truckloads of gravel. Where is that topsoil going? And when is it coming back? This project is proposed to last 35 to 40 years.
The editorial quoted the leased landowner (former farmer), stating that he would not be putting tons of fertilizer, pesticides, and herbicides on his land anymore. “That’s all poison,” he said. The solar companies all claim that they will be letting the soil rest and it will be better than what we farmers make it. This is all falsehoods! And it is insulting to hard-working farmers that are making your food. Anyone with even a garden knows that a producing plant draws nutrients out of the soil, and to maintain the fertility of the soil, these nutrients must be replaced — that’s called fertilizer. And to control weeds, you use herbicides, or tillage, or crop rotation. Real farmers follow BMP (Best Management Practices) and must be trained and certified to apply fertilizers and herbicides. We work so hard to follow these practices correctly, and frankly, it’s too expensive to do it wrong! Will the Canadian Solar company show the same care for our farmland that we do? They make claims that they will graze sheep to control the weeds. Do solar companies have access to 200,000 sheep for Ohio’s proposed 100,000 acres of panels?
And there are so many other issues. Like the “wildlife friendly” fence that is used to keep the wildlife out of their natural habitat. This will result in all the deer that reside in the 2,264-acre project area, to join the deer on our neighboring farmland and backyards, eating our crops and plants. And running across the roads.
One final issue that this editorial has entirely backward is how the local neighborhood became “activists.” No special interest groups showed up to inspire the formation of our opposition group. We saw what was coming and decided to do something about it before it was too late. If the editor would look back in his own newspaper, he will be reminded that Henry Bergfeld and I (local farmers) addressed the county commissioners at multiple commissioner meetings to inform them of the project and our concerns. Then some concerned citizens began circulating a petition to verify the extent of the opposition. The project is planned to surround the villages of Summitville and Millport and our wonderfully active and historical St. John the Evangelist Church! We have had no trouble gathering hundreds of signatures. We then decided in order to successfully halt this invasive, inefficient, and harmful project, we needed to form our citizen’s group called FAKS (Franklin Against Kensington Solar). All the county, township, and local officials have now heard their constituents and have written their resolutions of opposition, as is their responsibility.
And “hypocritical”? Maybe the only hypocrite here is someone who calls themselves a farmer when they really just sold out to a solar company owned by a foreign country to become an industrial park of Chinese panels, using U.S. stimulus money (i.e., our tax dollars) at the rate of $50,000 per acre. (isaac.orr@americanexperiment.org )
So, Columbiana County, straighten up your “No Solar Project” signs, they are coming after your backyard. Contact your township trustees, they know what to do.
“Not in my backyard”, you’re darn right. Put this project where the sun shines!
A farmer,
Diane Brown
theFAKS.org
Salineville