Wisconsin bill to regulate renewable energy development, especially on farmland 

A bill in the Wisconsin State Assembly would add regulations to the development of energy projects in the state, including renewable energy installations.

Dubbed the 2025 Wisconsin Energy Reform Act, the bill would discouragee renewable energy companies from using prime farmland in the state and outlines specific rights for landowners, among other provisions. Wisconsin Rep. Travis Tranel, R–Cuba City, is a cosponsor of the bill.

Rural activists in southwest Wisconsin, where several renewable energy projects have been proposed or are in progress, applauded the bill, while critics have expressed concern over language they see as creating unfair business practices.

“I think this is a fabulous step in the right direction,” said Pete Moris, of Mount Hope.

Moris in recent years has helped organize numerous community meetings in southwest Wisconsin in opposition to wind energy projects.

Speakers and attendees at these meetings, which have drawn hundreds, have expressed concerns about utility companies’ transparency with area residents and about impacts to agriculture and the environment.

The bill attempts to address some of these transparency concerns, such as by mandating companies provide written notice of their plans to each property owned within a mile of a proposed facility at least 45 days before submitting a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity application with the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin.

“I think the advanced notification of non-participating land owners is very encouraging,” Moris said.

The bill also addresses land protection concerns, such as by mandating that companies prepare decommissioning and drainage plans and by disincentivizing the use of “prime farmland” for energy projects as defined by National Commodity Crop Productivity Index, a U.S. Department of Agriculture metric.

Under the bill, companies in some cases would need to purchase agricultural conservation easements on either double or quadruple the amount of acres on which the energy system projects are located, depending on its score in the index. These easements prohibit land from being developed in a way that would make it unsuitable for agricultural use.

Tranel said this would incentivize the companies to use less agriculturally productive lands, for which the rule does not apply.

“That’s probably the most important part of the bill,” Tranel said. “The idea is to encourage developers to use less desirable land.”

Tranel said he and his constituents’ concerns with southwest Wisconsin renewable energy projects do not stem from a blanket opposition to renewable energy, but an opposition to how past and current projects were developed.

“A majority of my constituents are not opposed to renewable energy, … but they don’t like it on prime farmland,” he said.

Other provisions in the bill include changing language around renewable energy quotas to encourage development of nuclear energy in Wisconsin, as well as mandating light mitigation technology systems on certain future wind energy systems and high-voltage transmission line towers. This technology triggers lights only when aircraft is detected, rather than blinking continuously – an aspect of current wind turbines about which Tranel said he has also heard constituent complaints.

The legislation has its critics, however, including from some conservative groups and Republican legislators.

Critics said some provisions in the bill are similar to previously rejected legislation that would have given utilities already doing business in Wisconsin the right of first refusal to build, own and maintain a new transmission line that connects to one of their existing ones.

In a press release, Wisconsin Rep. Nate Gustafson, R-Fox Crossing, called the bill an expansion of state control and “central planning in a different wrapper.”

“Real reform means getting government out of the way – not writing more rules, carving out special deals, or micromanaging the energy sector from Madison,” Gustafson wrote.

Still, Tranel said the new bill provides more transparency than previous iterations of right-of-first-refusal legislation, which he had opposed. He said some concessions were necessary to get the regulations his constituents wanted.

“The only way to get meaningful reform is (the companies) get some of what they want, and we get some of what we want,” he said.

Representatives for Pattern Energy and Invenergy, two developers of planned southwest Wisconsin wind energy projects, did not respond to requests for comment.