Category Archives: Wind Energy

NC Senate: Proposed 2017 Budget

May 10, 2017.  Some highlights of the state budget proposed by Senate leadership as it affects environmental programs:

Money. The Senate budget continues  a nearly 10-year trend of cuts in environmental programs. An earlier post described some of the impacts of previous  budget cuts that began with the  2008 recession (including a 9% reversion of already-budgeted funds in 2009) and continued after the economy began to recover.

The Senate’s proposed budget for 2017 would reduce state appropriations to the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) by nearly $7 million.  That represents a 10% reduction in state appropriations and a 3% reduction in the department’s overall budget (which also includes federal grant funds and permit fees).

The reductions include:

♦ A $3.5 million discretionary cut,  which means DEQ will have to identify  reductions within the department’s operating budget.

♦  A $1 million transfer of funds  to the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (DACS) to challenge an EPA rule defining federal jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. Under the McCrory administration, DEQ had joined  a number of other states in suing over the federal rule.  The Cooper administration dropped out of the litigation and the Senate provision would fund DACS  to continue the state’s participation in that litigation.

♦ The budget eliminates  56.5 positions from existing DEQ programs:

      32.5 positions in the Division of Environmental Assistance and Customer Service. Those cuts affect non-regulatory waste reduction, recycling,  water/energy efficiency and  permit assistance programs. The cuts would effectively eliminate DEQ programs that work with business/industry to voluntarily reduce waste generation which allows those businesses and industries  to reduce their regulatory burden and save money.

      14 regional office support positions. DEQ’s seven regional offices house frontline permitting and enforcement staff for multiple environmental programs. The legislature has targeted DEQ  regional offices for staff cuts in the past. This provision requires a reduction of an additional 2 positions in each  regional office. It is not clear which DEQ programs would be affected.

      5  administrative positions. The Senate bill  identifies specific jobs for elimination, including  DEQ’s Chief Deputy Secretary,  the Legislative Affairs Program Manager; a communications position; and the last two environment education positions remaining in the department.

      3 positions in the N.C. Geodetic Survey

      1 position in the Land Quality Section of the Division of Energy, Mineral and Land Resources

      1 position in the Division of Marine Fisheries

Policy provisions in the budget bill. The budget bill includes a number of changes in state law or policy related to environmental programs:

♦  Conditions on use of funds the state may receive as a result of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s settlement with Volkswagen for violations of the Clean Air Act (Sec. 13.2 )  The Senate provision sets criteria for use of the funds and requires legislative approval of a DEQ plan for the funds.

♦  A provision  that allows the owners of old landfill sites to avoid environmental cleanup requirements by: 1. Accepting liability for onsite and offsite contamination; and 2. Providing financial assurance for any environmental harm.  There is an exception for property owners who did not receive compensation to accept local government waste for disposal. The provision affects a state program to assess and cleanup contamination associated with landfills and trash dumps that never met standards for solid waste landfills adopted in 1983. (iSec. 13.4).

♦  Changes to laws governing the Marine Fisheries Commission (Sec. 13.17) . The provision reduces the MFC from nine members to seven members and requires a super-majority of five  members to take any action — including adoption of rules. As with most state commissions, current law only requires a simple majority of the MFC to take most actions although a super-majority is required for adoption of fisheries management plans.

♦  A moratorium on wind energy projects (Sec. 24.2). The bill would prevent DEQ from issuing permits for new wind energy projects until December 31. 2020. During the moratorium, the bill would require a study of the impact of wind energy facilities on military operations in the state. Note; the process for approval of wind energy facilities already requires Federal Aviation Administration review and  input from military  installations.

Regulating Renewable Energy Away?

May 11, 2016.  North Carolina’s General Assembly has been engaged in an internal battle over state renewable energy policy since 2013. That year, Republican legislators first introduced a bill to repeal the state’s renewable energy portfolio standard; the REPS law requires electric utilities to gradually increase the amount of power generated from renewable sources such as wind, solar and waste combustion. (For more on the REPS issue, see earlier posts here and here.)  The 2013 REPS repeal bill failed; similar bills to repeal or significantly limit the REPS requirement have been introduced every year since without success. Opponents of renewable energy subsidies did succeed in eliminating a state tax credit for renewable energy projects effective December 31, 2015.

In the just-convened 2016 legislative session, opposition to renewable energy has taken a new form — a  bill to put significant regulatory constraints on development of renewable energy projects. Senate Bill 843 (Renewable Energy Property Protection) expands an existing wind energy permitting law to cover other types of renewable energy facilities and adds new permitting requirements and regulatory standards.  Key provisions in Senate Bill 843:

Scope.  The bill applies to most renewable energy facilities other than hydroelectric plants, including solar,  wind and  waste-to-energy combustion projects. The proposed permitting standards do not apply to solar panels installed on single-family homes or to  “biomass resources”.  Since the bill only excludes solar installations on  single-family homes, the new permitting standards presumably apply to solar panels installed on commercial and institutional buildings (such as schools and churches) as well as utility-scale solar projects. It isn’t clear what the exclusion for  “biomass resources” means;  the term could be applied to plant-based fuels as well as combustion of animal waste.

Additional steps in the permitting process. Those steps include: 1. a  pre-application meeting with state regulators at least 120 days before submission of the permit application; 2. submission of pre-application project information 45 days before the meeting; and 3. notice of the pre-application meeting to federal regulatory agencies (such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers) and to “any other party [DEQ] deems relevant”. The bill also expands an existing wind energy permitting requirement  for a “scoping” meeting 60 days before application to all renewable energy projects —  even though the new pre-application meeting  and the scoping meeting seem to involve the same participants and much of the same information. See G.S. 143-215.118.

Addition of new standards for denial of renewable energy permits. The existing law setting standards for issuing or denying wind energy projects would be amended to cover all renewable energy projects and to add  two new grounds for permit denial. The new permit denial standards:

♦ Operation of the facility would cause ambient noise levels to exceed 35 decibels at the property line.

♦ The applicant failed to meet new financial assurance requirements for decommissioning the facility.

See the existing text of  G.S. 143-215.120 for the existing permit denial standards.

Setback and buffer requirements for wind and other renewable energy facilities. All wind and other renewable energy facilities would have to be sited 1 1/2 miles from the property line of an adjacent property. For comparison,  some examples of property line setback requirements for other state-permitted facilities and activities are shown below.

Facility/Activity Property Line Setback
Oil and gas production (including wells and drilling waste storage)  0 ft
Major air pollutant sources  0 ft
Land application sites for septage  50 ft
Hazardous waste landfills  200 ft
Swine house or  swine waste lagoon  500 ft

A quick search did not turn up an existing  state-imposed property line setback of greater than  500 feet.

S 843 also requires wind and renewable energy facilities to be setback from all easements and rights of way for a state road or municipal street by a distance equal to 2 1/2 times the height of a wind turbine. Some wind turbines proposed in N.C. have a tower height of around 300 feet and total height (based on extension of one blade straight up)  of nearly 500 feet, resulting in a  road setback of 800-1250 feet.

New requirements for decommissioning a renewable energy facility, including financial assurance for decommissioning. The bill requires the owner/operator of a wind or renewable energy facility to remove all equipment and buildings and return the site to predevelopment conditions within one year after ceasing operation. The requirement seems to be unprecedented as applied to a utility or commercial development project.  To the extent existing laws include reclamation  or closure standards, the standards generally focus on eliminating specific safety hazards (appropriately closing abandoned wells); taking steps to prevent environmental degradation (capping closed landfills)  and restoring disturbed areas to provide stability and prevent erosion.  State permitting programs  do not normally require the owner/operator to return a site to pre-development conditions by removing buildings and equipment.

S 843  also makes the owner/operator responsible for “properly recycling each piece of equipment used in the facility”.  State law already prohibits landfill disposal of specific types of waste such as aluminum cans, scrap tires and computer equipment. (See G.S. 130A-310 for a complete list of materials banned from landfill disposal.)  S 843 appears to go much further and require recycling of all equipment used in a renewable energy facility.  The recycling requirement for renewable energy facilities looks particularly burdensome by comparison to a 2013 state law allowing  demolition debris from a decommissioned electric generation station to be buried on site. See G.S. 130A-301.3.

Strict liability for damages caused by construction, maintenance, operation, decommissioning, disassembly or demolition of a renewable energy facility. The bill would impose strict liability on the owner/operator of a renewable energy facility. “Strict liability” means the owner/operator  could be held liable for personal injury or property damage caused by the activity even if the damage was not the result of  intentional misconduct, negligence, or violation of any regulatory standard. Strict liability  can also deny the  owner/operator the benefit of some usual defenses against a damage claim — such as the defense that the injured person caused or contributed to their own injury. Usually,  strict liability is reserved for inherently dangerous activities where it provides an incentive for extra caution on the part of the person engaged  in the activity.  Very few  N.C. laws create strict liability for personal injury or property damage;  one applies to   owners of dangerous dogs and another makes parents responsible for damage caused by their minor child.   A few laws create a sort of limited strict liability.  For example, state law generally assumes a  hydraulic fracturing operation  will be liable for contamination of a water supply located within 5,000 feet of a natural gas well. But in that case, the presumption of liability only applies to one type of injury  occurring in a very specific  set of circumstances  — not to all injury or damage caused by a  fracking operation.

Taken together, the provisions in Senate Bill 843 treat renewable energy facilities as a serious threat to public safety and the environment.

Legislative Wrap-Up II: Energy

August 2, 2013: Highlights of energy legislation.

Shale Gas/Hydraulic Fracturing. This is one area where the big news may be the legislative proposals that failed. The Senate adopted two controversial  shale gas provisions, but neither passed the House. Legislation adopted in 2012 effectively put a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing  by prohibiting issuance of permits until  the Mining and Energy Commission adopted rules and the  General Assembly acted to specifically allow permitting.  The N.C. Senate had always wanted to set a specific date for permitting to begin and tried again this year in Senate Bill 76 (the Domestic Energy Jobs Act). The version of the bill that came out of the Senate repealed the 2012   language  and authorized the Department of Environment and Natural Resources to begin issuing permits for hydraulic fracturing on March 1,  2015 without any further legislative action.  The House had concerns about the change. After back and forth on alternative language and  intensive lobbying in the  last  days of the legislative session, the final bill kept the permitting moratorium in place.

The other controversial Senate proposal  had to do with disclosure of information on chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing fluid. The Senate  intervened on behalf of the oil and gas industry when energy giant Halliburton expressed concern about a chemical disclosure rule drafted by the Mining and Energy Commission. The commission’s draft rule requires drilling companies to disclose all chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing fluid to the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, but allows DENR to keep any trade secret information confidential. You can find more about the chemical disclosure rule and trade secret protection in this post.   In an effort to make the rule more acceptable to the oil and gas industry, the Senate adopted language directing the Mining and Energy Commission to revise the rule to allow  drilling operators to withhold information on trade secret chemicals unless DENR needed the information to respond to environmental damage or a specific health problem.  In the face of significant opposition,   the Senate  modified the language to allow   state regulators  to review information on trade secret chemicals at the same time the drilling company  disclosed  other chemicals used in the fracturing fluid. The revised language did not allow DENR  to actually receive  information on trade secret chemicals — the department could only review  information  that remained  in the drilling company’s possession.  In the final  days of the legislative session, the  bill containing the Senate  language died and the restriction on chemical disclosure died with it.  Failure of the legislation allows the Mining and Energy Commission  to move ahead with the original draft rule on chemical disclosure.

The final version of Senate Bill 76 signed by the Governor included a number of  less controversial changes related to shale gas and hydraulic fracturing:

– Rules adopted by the Mining and Energy Commission are exempted from the  requirement for a fiscal analysis. State law  generally  requires every proposed rule that has an economic impact of $1 million or more (based on the total impact on everyone affected by the rule)  to be accompanied by a  fiscal analysis.

–  Minor changes in the makeup of the MIning and Energy Commission.

– Three new studies to look at:  1. creation of a coordinated permitting process that will allow issuance of a single environmental permit for all oil and gas exploration and production activities; 2. the appropriate level of severance tax for oil and gas resources; and 3. implementation of  the 2012 registration requirement for people involved in  purchase or lease of property for oil and gas exploration and development.

– Technical amendments to an existing law allowing the state to limit the total amount of oil and gas produced in the state (G.S. 113-394).

–  New criteria for setting the amount of  the reclamation bond required for oil and gas activities and a process for either the drilling company or the property owner to appeal the bond amount.

LEED Certification.  House Bill 628 (Protect/Promote Locally Sourced Building Materials) was signed into law after a major rewrite in the Senate.  The  original House bill would have prohibited state building projects from seeking Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification under U.S. Green Building Council standards because few North Carolina forestry operations meet standards necessary to earn LEED credit for sustainable wood products. You can find more explanation of the controversy over sustainable forest practices and the LEED standard here.  The Senate rewrote the bill to allow construction of state projects under “green” building standards that  give credit for use of local building materials — which LEED standards do.   The  final bill also calls  for study of the energy efficiency standards for state buildings that were adopted in 2007.

Renewable Energy.  Legislation to repeal the state’s Renewable Energy Portolio Standard  died.   With the support of a number of conservative political organizations — including Americans for Prosperity — House Bill 298 and Senate Bill 365 (both titled the Affordable and Reliable Energy Act)  proposed to repeal the 2007 state law requiring major electric utilities to generate an increasing percentage of power from renewable energy sources.  An earlier post talked about the politics of the renewable energy standard and  the practical problem the bill presented for Republican  legislators. The tension between the practical (jobs) and the political (conservative opposition to  subsidies for renewable energy) played out in both the House and the Senate.  In the end, neither bill got all of the committee approvals needed to get to  a floor vote.

The General Assembly adopted legislation setting up a permitting program for  wind energy projects (House Bill 484). The bill largely responds to concerns about the potential impact of wind turbines on military training  activities in the coastal area. Two onshore coastal wind projects already proposed for the coastal area had generated questions about interference with radar and risk to pilots flying low-level military training routes.  Aside from establishing environmental criteria for permitting wind turbines, the bill requires DENR to provide notice of  the permit application to commanders at  nearby military installations and to the Federal Aviation Administration. The bill makes interference with military operations a basis for denying  a wind energy permit.

The final budget for 2013-2015  eliminated state funding for the N.C. Biofuels Center. The General Assembly created the Biofuels Center in 2007 to  encourage  biofuels production in N.C. using  non-food crops.  The Biofuels Center set a goal of replacing 10% of the state’s imported petroleum with homegrown biofuels. To develop biofuels production, the Biofuels Center made grants to support biofuels research and to develop pilot  projects.  Late in July, the N.C. Biofuels Center board decided that it would not be practical to continue operations without state funding; the  Center will  close by the end of October and unused grant money will be returned to the state.

Offshore Energy.  Senate Bill 76 also addressed offshore energy production. One section of the  bill creates a plan for allocating revenue from offshore energy production off the N.C. coast. The first $250 million in royalties to the state would go into an Offshore Emergency Fund to be used for emergency response and cleanup in case of an offshore oil or gas spill. Any royalties to the state beyond the first $250 million would go largely to the General Fund (75%); the remaining 25% would be divided among the Highway Trust fund (5%), the Community College System (5% for programs to train students in fields related to energy development), DENR (5% for coastal projects), the UNC system (5% for energy-related research and development); State Ports Authority (3% for ports infrastructure associated with energy production); and Department of Commerce (2% to recruit energy-related industries to the state).

Note: Offshore oil and gas production would almost certainly occur in federal waters beyond the three-mile limit of state jurisdiction. North Carolina will not receive any royalties from offshore production in federal waters unless Congress specifically authorizes revenue-sharing with the state.

The bill also encourages  the Governor to negotiate a regional energy compact with the states of Virginia and South Carolina to develop a regional strategy for offshore energy production in the three-state region. The General Assembly directs Governor McCrory to work with his counterparts in those states to encourage the U.S. Department of Interior to amend the national 2012-2017 Five Year Leasing Plan to include leasing for oil and gas exploration and development in waters of the Atlantic Ocean off the VA-NC-SC coast.

Energy Policy Act.  Senate Bill 76  makes significant changes to the state’s Energy Policy Act (the Act begins at G.S. 113B-1). The changes  generally run in the direction of  reducing  the emphasis on energy efficiency and renewable energy and increasing  the emphasis on job creation.   The amended Energy Policy Act has more to say about expanding development of all energy sources – including natural gas and nuclear power — and much less about energy conservation.  The bill changes the makeup of the Energy Policy Council (an advisory board created to guide state energy policy) along the same lines:

– The seat on the Council for a person  with experience in alternative fuels or biofuels becomes a seat for a representative of  an investor-owned natural gas utility.

–  The seat designated for a person  with experience in energy efficient building design or construction  becomes a seat for  an energy economist.

–  The seat on the Council for a person with experience in renewable energy becomes a seat for an industrial energy consumer.

The General Assembly also consolidated state energy programs in the Department of Environment and Natural Resources. The budget bill moves the State Energy Office (which has largely carried out federally funded energy efficiency programs) from the Department of Commerce to DENR. Senate Bill 76  moves the Energy Policy Council, which had also been under the Department of Commerce,   to DENR. The Council will be  staffed by the Division of Mineral, Energy and Land Resources.

Odds and Ends on Energy

April 6, 2013

Wind Energy

Offshore: Last fall, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) finished  a  renewable energy lease plan for the waters of the Atlantic Ocean off the  North Carolina coast. BOEM  asked companies interested in  developing  wind energy in the designated lease areas to submit a proposal by March 7, 2013. Five companies sent in wind energy development proposals (Virginia Electric and Power Company, EDF Renewable Energy, Fisherman’s Energy LLC, Green Sail Energy LLC, and Outer Banks Ocean Energy LLC.) Find complete information on the proposals  here .  The BOEM website provides more information  on the   renewable energy lease plan  for  waters off the North Carolina coast.

Onshore (and near shore): Bills have been introduced in the N.C.  General Assembly  to create a state permitting process for wind energy facilities. Senate Bill 491  (= H 484)  creates a new state permit to be issued by  the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR).   The permit review would look at both environmental impacts and  impacts on military operations.  Last year, two land-based wind  projects proposed for sites near the North Carolina coast (one in  Beaufort County and  the other in Pasquotank and Perquimans  counties)  raised concern at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base near Goldsboro.  (There are more onshore wind energy projects  proposed for  the coastal counties, but  not as far along in the planning/site approval process.)

The  military has two concerns about the siting of wind turbines:  radar interference caused by  movement of the blades  and  risk of  collision between low-flying military aircraft and wind turbines that may be more than  500 feet tall. North Carolina’s  coastal counties have a large amount of  military special use airspace, including training routes  that have “floors” as low as 200 feet.  Wind energy development could be a real  economic boost to  interior and largely rural areas of the coastal counties. The trick will be to make wind energy development compatible with military operations that  contribute significantly to the broader state economy and have an important role in national defense. The Department of Defense has a clearinghouse for review of development projects that may affect military operations.   The new state wind permit would provide a  way to consider military concerns in state decision-making.

Note: State jurisdiction only extends three miles from shore in the Atlantic Ocean, so most offshore wind projects  only require  federal permits.  North Carolina can influence federal permitting and lease decisions  for   offshore energy development  (whether wind turbines or oil and gas production) through the state’s coastal management program.

Study Links Underground Disposal of Wastewater and 2011 Oklahoma Earthquake

This  New York Times article provides a good overview of a recent study (published in the journal Geology) concluding that underground disposal of wastewater from oil production caused a 2011 Oklahoma earthquake that measured 5.7 on the Richter scale, destroyed a number of homes and injured two people. The Oklahoma Geological Survey reached a different conclusion.

Could Fracking and Renewable Energy Make a Happy  Marriage?

Kevin Drum,  writing  for Mother Jones, has an interesting blogpost on  fracking and renewable energy.

Postcards From the Coast: Offshore Drilling

March 6, 2013

First,  a postcard from Raleigh to the coast — While fracking has used up most of the oxygen in recent  discussions of  state energy policy, offshore energy development has  taken on new political life.   The sections of Senate Bill 76 dealing with shale gas production have gotten more attention, but the bill also revives  legislative proposals on offshore  energy  development that did not survive  the 2011-2012 session. These sections of the bill apply to all kinds of offshore energy generation (including ocean  wind  turbines), but the bill clearly intends to  signal support for  offshore oil and gas drilling.

In Section 7, Senate Bill 76 proposes a way to divide up state revenue received from  offshore energy  production.   Whatever the merits of the Senate plan  — and it seems designed to promise money for every good thing possible —  it is not certain that the state will ever receive revenue from offshore  energy  production.   The United States has had no experience with  offshore wind turbines and the economics of ocean wind energy make it  an unlikely revenue  source.  Most oil and gas drilling sites are in federal  waters outside the limits of state jurisdiction;  all revenue from drilling in federal waters goes to the  United States  treasury unless Congress authorizes  revenue sharing with the   states.   Gulf Coast states benefit from a federal formula for sharing revenue from production in the Gulf of Mexico and something similar would be needed to allow  Atlantic coast states to receive revenue from production along the eastern seaboard.  Assuming Congress allows revenue sharing for Atlantic coast oil and gas production, the benefit to North Carolina  will depend on where  drilling  occurs and how  the revenue sharing formula works.

Note: The U.S. Department of Interior is not currently issuing offshore oil and gas leases in Atlantic coast waters.  Under the department’s  5- year lease plan, no Atlantic coast leases will be offered until 2018 at the earliest.

The bill also encourages the Governor to negotiate an interstate offshore energy compact with the governors of Virginia and South Carolina. As described in the bill, the purpose of the compact would largely be to lobby for earlier issuance of  oil and gas leases  off  the  east coast of the United States; revenue sharing for Atlantic coast states; and quicker permitting of offshore oil and gas activities.

Although Senate Bill 76 has not yet become law, Governor McCrory has already checked off two  items on the bill’s to-do list. Governor McCrory   joined the governors of South Carolina and Virginia in sending a letter to the President’s nominee for Secretary of the Interior, Sally Jewell,   urging her to  open east coast waters for oil and gas drilling  sooner.  A February 14 press release  issued by Gov. McCrory’s office includes excerpts from the letter and a link to the full text of the letter.

The following week, Governor McCrory joined the governors of Alaska, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina   as a new member of the Outer Continental Shelf Governor’s coalition.  The coalition advocates for more offshore leasing, quicker permitting of offshore oil and gas operations, and revenue sharing for all states with offshore energy production.

Senate Bill 76 has passed the Senate; the bill will go through three House committees (Commerce, Environment and Finance) before reaching the House floor.