Minutes 05-27-2014 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

Commissioner McKee: Okay. Also, on the buffers that mention the trees. Do you have a timeline before these 8 foot trees will become 15 foot trees, 20, 30 foot. Because in my mind it's a radical difference between waiting a year, or 3 years, or 30 years to get these, this buffer in place. Mike Wallace: I understand. That is not my area of expertise. That is something that. Commissioner McKee: I didn't know if there was a study or if you all have figures on that. Michael Fox: If the Commissioner would like, I know that the landscaping plan and the company that they hire can provide projections on average of what a typical tree species will grow over a certain period year. It's not exact for a particular tree in a site, but we can provide that along with the other information that we were going to provide to Mrs. Gordon. We can provide that to the planning director or the planning staff for the Commissioners' consideration. Commissioner McKee: And then one more question, I guess to you since you're the attorney. Michael Fox: Yes sir. Commissioner McKee: It was mentioned that if at the end of the lease or end of the lifespan the equipment could be disassembled and removed from the meadow, and it would revert to a meadow. Who would do that, and what would happen in a case of this company either folding or dissolving, or for some reason this facility not being used? Is there a plan in place as to the end of the life, the end of the lease, or the disruption of the company, the removal of this—of all of this equipment. And who does that, and who pays? Michael Fox: Yes sir. I'd like to address one part of that question and then I'll ask Mr. Cleveland to come up and address a second part of the answer. To answer your first part of the question of who's responsible; it's the company. Sunlight is responsible in the event that the lease terminates. They have a short period of time to come in and remove essentially everything. And the only thing that would be troublesome at all to remove would be you know the pads on which the inverters sit. They are about the size of a pickup truck bed of concrete, and those are the only things that are really semi-permanent, but they could be removed as well. In the event— now that's the contractual obligation —and in the event that let's say some disaster befell Sunlight and no one wanted to step in and own this project, which is unlikely. It is generating energy for Duke Energy and that's who the contract is with to sell the energy to. So there are a lot of folks who would be interested in a site like this. But let's just say worst case scenario, nobody out there wants it. There has been a study out there, which Mr. Cleveland can discuss, which indicates that the salvage value even using average salvage prices of the materials in a solar farm for exceed the cost of the salvage. So the bottom line is that it wouldn't be difficult to get someone to come in and take it all out, essentially for free. So it's not something that's gonna be—that's not gonna be left there— an eyesore for the neighborhood. Mr. Cleveland, could you talk a little bit about that study and who did it. Tommy Cleveland: I can tell you a little bit about that study. That was done by a developer with significant experience developing and building very similar 5 megawatt sites in North Carolina. And they went to a general contractor and said; what would you charge us today with your going labor rates to come and remove all this equipment from the site. And they got that number and then they went and looked at salvage markets for steel, copper, aluminum and used solar panels at something like two cents on the dollar of the current price for the panels,