Falls City Council hears comments on proposed Love Canal solar farm project
Oct. 16—Members of the Niagara Falls City Council received just a handful of comments at a public hearing Wednesday night on a proposed zoning change that would be the first step in allowing a portion of the site of the worst environmental disaster involving chemical wastes in U.S. history to be transformed into a large-scale, eco-friendly, solar renewable energy project.
Council members are considering a request from city officials and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) to change the zoning of 16 acres of city-owned land, south of Colvin Boulevard, north of the LaSalle Expressway and between 93rd and 95th streets from R1-A (Single Family Residential) to OS (Open Space). The change would allow for the land, that was once the location of the Griffin Housing Development, in what is known as the Love Canal neighborhood, to be reclaimed and developed into the Vincent Welch Build-Ready Solar project.
The proposed solar farm site is a short distance from what was the Hooker Chemical Company's Love Canal landfill. Gillian D. Black, director of NYSERDA's Build-Ready program, has described the project location as "directly west of the fenced and capped Love Canal site."
The zoning change has already been unanimously recommended to the council by both the Niagara County and Niagara Falls planning boards.
Public speakers who attended a planning board public hearing on the project had raised questions about the project's impact on the remaining toxic waste encased at the landfill site. Planning Board Chair Tony Palmer said the zoning change was just the first of many hurdles for the project.
Palmer said the city and NYSERDA would have to return to the planning board for a site plan approval before construction work on the solar farm could begin.
Speaking to the city council at Wednesday's public hearing, former City Council Member Vincent Cauley suggested that there might be a "higher calling or purpose" for the proposed solar farm site, such as "a park or low-income housing."
Lori Butera, who lives nearby, said she had been concerned about the impact of the project on the woods and wildlife in the area. She said an NYSERDA representative had eased her fears.
"Apparently, it's not going to affect that," Butera told the city lawmakers. "I still have concerns with the Love Canal ground itself."
Amanda Wyckoff, a NYSERDA project manager, who attended the public hearing, but did not speak to the council, has previously said that her agency was in "the early stages" of assessing the feasibility of the solar farm project. Wyckoff has said that the assessment would include a determination of whether the location of the solar farm would allow it to be connected to the larger New York electrical grid, and if so, what the cost of the connection would be.
New York State says the Build-Ready program is designed to "advance large-scale renewable energy projects on difficult sites that the private sector isn't developing." Among the "difficult sites" that Build-Ready says it considers for development are brownfields, landfills, existing or abandoned commercial and industrial sites, dormant electric generating sites, former mines and closed prisons and parking lots.
When a site is identified for redevelopment, Build-Ready says it undertakes the project design, engineering, permitting, and electrical grid interconnection review as well as developing a host community benefit package.
"We act as a private developer would to bring the land back on the tax rolls," Black said. "We negotiate PILOT (payment in lieu of taxes) agreements, community benefit agreements, we act like a private developer to bring difficult sites back for renewable energy generation, but we don't compete with the private sector."
The Love Canal site was first proposed to NYSERDA by the administration of Mayor Robert Restaino and Black said there have been ongoing discussions of the project with the mayor and his staff.
The plan for the site calls for the use of a ballasted solar electric system. Such a system uses concrete weights to anchor the framing that holds the panels used for solar energy collection to the ground.
Black said those systems are "well-engineered for contaminated properties like the Love Canal" because they do not need posts or post holes to be held in place.
"There is no need to puncture the ground," Black said, "which is the best for capped properties (like the Love Canal) where the caps can or should not be penetrated."
