The Stony Point Town Board passed a law at the end of
January allowing for large-scale solar generating facilities.
"We're always looking for clean, safe, renewable energy
sources," Stony Point Supervisor Jim Monaghan said. "Solar energy has
been getting more and more popular."
Monaghan said many residents in Stony Point have already
opted to use solar panels at their homes, but there were no laws in place to
allow a large solar panel field within the township.
"There's a lot of solar companies that reach out to
municipalities," Monaghan said. "We're looking to public and private
partnerships to see if there's a way to bring solar energy to Stony
Point."
Applications for large-scale solar generating facilities
must include site, property maintenance and decommissioning plans, according to
the new law.
The law also accounts for the size and coverage of the lots,
glare, tree maintenance and removal, the height of the panels and proximity to
roadways, buffer zones for residential zones and minimal view-blockage for
neighboring homes.
Monaghan said one of the difficulties that Stony Point
faces is they do not have any large tracts of public land that would be
appropriate for a solar field.
"There's limited areas that we have in Stony
Point," Monaghan said. "There's only a few areas where people have
large properties."
Green Street Solar Power approached Marian Shrine in
2016 to lease for 25 years 15 acres of open land adjacent to Don
Bosco Lane.
Mia Behm, a spokeswoman for the Bronx-based company, said in
an email in 2017 that the company was proposing a $4-million, 1,800-kilowatt solar
farm with 5,100 solar panels.
Father James McKenna said the field was suitable
because it has no trees, but could be problematic due to a lack of buffer
zone and visibility from the houses.
"The Shrine has no objections to be able to have this
particular thing on this property," McKenna said. "It's not going to
take the place of Indian Point but it is another option they want to give the
local community."
Monaghan said this is step forward in the conversation
surrounding energy production in the county related to the impending closing of
Indian Point.
"We don't want to rely on foreign energy,"
Monaghan said. "Not only as a community but as a country, we have to come
up with (an alternative)."
McKenna said he has not heard back from the company since
the law was passed. The solar field is not necessary for the Shrine to stay
operational, and any profits from the field would go toward the
retirement of elderly priests, he said.
If the solar field is installed, Marian Shrine
would lose their tax exemption for the part of the property that would
house the panels, according to Monaghan. McKenna said that the company
that leases the land would be responsible for the taxes.
McKenna said the grid would be able to support about 300
homes in addition to subsidizing some of the energy used by the Shrine.
A few years back, Clarkstown installed a solar panel field
on 13-acres of a former landfill.
"We're very impressed with what Clarkstown did with
their landfill," Monaghan said.
Monaghan said the Town Board held several public hearings
and kept the law on the agenda for a significant amount of time in order to get
public input.
"It's something we didn't rush," he
said. "It would be nice to ... take advantage of clean, safe
renewable energy."
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