Area Energy Farm Permit Requests Will Be Revised

By Tammy Gray-Searles
   NZ Legacy officials announced Sept. 25 that the company plans to revise its applications for special use permits for several energy farms between Holbrook and Snowflake.
   The company’s request to Navajo County to construct the energy farms has met with resistance from residents and landowners near the proposed sites. Concerns regarding noise, dust, health and safety have been raised, as well as of the amount of water that would be needed to operate solar generating units.
   Rather than asking for approval for the entire project, as in the initial applications, NZ Legacy President Duane Black noted that the company would be requesting the permits in phases, starting with the meteorological (met) towers.
   “NZ Legacy, after holding more than six hours of its own hearings that followed a number of county-sponsored hearings, is modifying its five renewable energy applications with Navajo County to phase in the approval of its wind and solar projects…,” Black said.
   According to Black, the company will seek approval to install the met towers to determine the wind resources in the area. If there is sufficient wind, the data collected will also be used to help determine exact placement of wind turbines. The announcement noted that phase one will “begin the wind study efforts by asking for meteorological tower approval only in order to see which areas have sufficient wind to consider towers.”
   NZ Legacy CEO Bob Worsley noted that the plans submitted with the original application were only conceptual, because no one knows yet exactly where the best wind resources are or where the towers would best be placed.
   “We are shadow boxing a bit here before we even know if we have sufficient wind to place any towers on our lands,” Worsley said. “Our approach to layout conceptual wind farms for the application was flawed as it looked more factual than it was intended to be.”
   “When met tower data becomes available, wind tower locations will be proposed in exact locations after consultation with Navajo County staff and neighborhood groups to avoid sound impacts to neighbors,” Black noted in his announcement.
   The permitting process will also include an additional phase for the solar portion of the project. NZ Legacy has committed to providing more detailed information about the type of solar technology it plans to use, as well as focusing on lower-water use technologies.
   “The second phase will be more detailed layouts of the solar projects with more of an emphasis on low- to no-water use technologies such as PV (photovoltaic), thin film and several new promising solar technologies such as those promoted by Stirling/Tessera and Southwest Solar’s SolarCat technology,” Black stated. “Concentrating solar power technology that uses water to the extent of traditional generation plants will be proposed for use sparingly and only after careful regulatory reviews regarding impacts on the Coconino aquifer.”
   Worsley noted that he is committed to the success of the project, and that area has “a combination of factors favorable for new renewable technologies: sunshine, wind, elevation and underground geologic assets, as well as proximity to electric load centers and existing transmission infrastructure.
   “We appreciate the hours of time that concerned citizens have given to this process thus far and hope to move forward with exciting new renewable projects with partners from a broad range of technologies in this new field while addressing concerns as the proceedings continue,” Worsley said. “We believe that Navajo and Apache counties could become the capital of renewables in the Southwest, since the area has been well-known for producing more than three gigawatts of coal generation.”
   NZ Legacy is proposing five separate energy farm projects. They include the F Bar Energy Project, located just northwest of Snowflake between Highway 77 and the railroad tracks that run parallel to the highway; the Mexican Hollow Energy Project, located southeast of Woodruff; the Hay Hollow Energy Project, located slightly farther south and east of Woodruff than the Mexican Hollow project; the Silver Creek Energy Project, located southwest of Woodruff, but east of Highway 77; and the Bar J Bar Energy Project, located slightly northwest of the Silver Creek Energy Project, also near Woodruff.
   A letter of intent submitted to the county outlined each proposed project, but Worsley has pointed out several times that the proposal is likely to change once data is collected by the met towers.
   According to the letter of intent, the F Bar Energy Project could include up to 60 wind turbines and 150 solar towers, with the plan currently including 43 wind turbines. Up to 120 megawatts could be generated by the wind turbines and 400 megawatts by the solar towers.
   Up to 80 wind turbines and 180 solar towers could be erected as part of the Mexican Hollow Energy Project, with 69 wind turbines currently in the plans. The Mexican Hollow project could generate up to 160 megawatts from wind and 500 megawatts from solar generators.
   A total of 75 wind turbines and 200 solar towers could be included in the Silver Creek Energy Project, with current plans calling for 50 wind turbines. The Silver Creek project could produce up to 150 megawatts of electricity from wind and 620 from solar.
   The Bar J Bar Energy Project would include up to as many as 50 wind turbines and 150 solar towers, but the existing site plan includes 37 wind turbines.
   “If built as planned, the proposed project would be capable of producing up to 100 megawatts of electricity from wind and 400 megawatts of electricity from solar,” the letter of intent notes.
   The special use permit requests for the energy projects must be approved by both the planning and zoning commission and the Navajo County Board of Supervisors before they are issued.