Jason Graziadei • March 08, 2024
Image via Shutterstock
A more than decade-long initiative to build Nantucket’s largest solar farm on the Wannacomet Water Company property off Milestone Road quietly ended this week.
On Wednesday, the Board of Elections formally voted to abandon the project by voiding the lease agreement with Solar Star Tranquility, a subsidiary of French energy giant TotalEnergies, which was selected to develop a 3.8 megawatt ground-mounted solar array in 2019. . The vote on the “mutual termination agreement” was passed without discussion among the members of the Selection Board.
Permitting issues — notably the state’s ruling last August that the property was subject to an article of the Massachusetts Constitution requiring state legislative approval — ultimately led to the project’s demise.
The solar farm has been in the works since 2011, when island voters at the Annual Town Meeting authorized a 25-year long-term lease of its property through a power purchase agreement for solar array development.
Wannacomet Water Company director Mark Willett said there was the possibility of a “smaller-scale” project on the property at some point in the future – specifically, solar panels on the roofs of the water company buildings – but confirmed the original project. It would be the largest solar array on the island.
“The size of the project is dead on, but we’re trying to do something smaller scale within Department of Environmental Protection regulations and what we can do at the well site,” Willett said. “Being on a well site and being a state-protected property, it’s always going to be a pretty big leap to get that. So we’re looking at doing some solar on the roofs and maybe a small ground array to offset the energy use here.”
The Solar Star Tranquility project would involve thousands of ground-mounted solar photovoltaic panels on two sites totaling 10.10 acres of Wannacomet Water Company property. The city hoped that during the property’s 25-year lease, the solar panels would offset the water company’s and the city’s energy use, while also helping to reduce peak electricity demand on the island during the summer months and generate clean energy. Offsetting 86,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions.
Plan of proposed solar array on Wannacomet Water Company property between Milestone and Old South roads.
Despite support from island voters at Biennial Town Meeting (2011 and 2016), along with approval from the Board of Selectmen and the Nantucket Water Commission, the project faced unexpected headwinds due to the restrictive nature of water company ownership.
As recently as last May, TotalEnergies representatives told the public that construction would begin in the fall of 2023. But it never happened.
For the previous two years, the Nantucket Land and Water Council (NLWC) had expressed concerns about several of the project’s political implications, saying it was subject to Article 97 of the Massachusetts Constitution. The provision is intended to ensure that land acquired by municipalities for conservation of natural resources cannot be used for other purposes without a two-thirds vote of the state legislature.
NLWC’s attorney wrote a legal opinion arguing that the water company’s property was indeed subject to Article 97, while city counsel KP Law wrote a conflicting opinion that it was not. In August 2023, the State Executive Office for Energy and Environmental Affairs reported that the property was subject to Article 97.
“This protection given to the property when it was first handed over to the city is incredibly important because this property sits directly above our public water supply well sites,” NLWC Executive Director Emily Molden wrote after the state’s decision. “After the 25-year lease for the proposed solar facility expires, we were deeply concerned about how future uses could affect this site and community water. Section 97 helps protect our right to clean water along with other natural waters. The long-term protection of this area and the public water supply must be a top priority for the city. The health and well-being of our community depends on it.”
According to the contract between the city and TotalEnergies, the state’s decision posed a “significant risk to the timely permitting, financing and development of the solar project.”
While the water company’s solar project is gone — at least for now — the city recently flipped the switch on a smaller, 232-panel solar array at the Surfside Wastewater Treatment Plant, and Bartlett’s Farm has about seven acres. working solar array. The number of private solar installations on Nantucket also continues to grow: