Planning Commission approves amendments to UDO solar rules, keeps 4,000-acre cap with new counting method

The Jefferson County Planning Commission on July 1 amended its draft Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) for commercial solar and voted to forward a favorable recommendation to the County Commissioners on the revised UDO.

Commissioners amended the UDO’s land‑coverage cap language so the county’s 4,000‑acre maximum for commercial solar projects will count acreage within fenced areas and tillable acreage outside fences that is taken out of production. The change was framed as a means to limit the amount of productive land removed from agricultural use while clarifying whether agricultural setback areas that remain in production are counted toward the cap.

“We currently have a land cap set that we would have a maximum of 4,000 acres of solar,” a Planning Commission member said. The same member calculated the proposed cap as a share of county land: “the 4,000 acres that we're proposing is 1.71 [percent], so we're below that 2% as far as what the state had recommended.” The discussion referenced a statehouse amendment that proposed limiting renewable projects to no more than 2% of a county’s land area, though the amendment was not enacted as law.

The amended UDO text presented to the commission reads in part that the cap will include areas within fenced project areas and tillable acreage outside fenced areas “which is taken out of production.” Commissioners debated whether setback areas left in agricultural production should count; the staff explanation was that setback acreage that remains farmed would not count toward the cap, but areas left fallow or otherwise removed from production would count.

Commissioners also discussed setbacks from nonparticipating properties and screening. The commission noted three setback proposals discussed during the UDO review: the county's earlier draft of 150 feet (based on an earlier Purdue/state recommendation), a proposed 500‑foot setback the commission had previously considered, and public comments suggesting a 1,000‑foot setback. A Planning Commission member said that increasing the setback to 1,000 feet would in effect make utility‑scale solar “extremely impractical” in much of the county and suggested that expanded screening, decommissioning and bonding rules were preferable ways to protect adjacent property interests.

The UDO amendments also retain several operational and decommissioning safeguards: a requirement that the project operator fund a third‑party decommissioning estimate, bond or escrow equal to 125% of that estimate, and periodic (every three years) updates to decommissioning cost estimates as a condition of a three‑year operation permit. The UDO as presented includes insurance minima of $5,000,000 for general liability and $5,000,000 for pollution liability, and soil sampling/decompaction requirements at decommissioning to return soils to baseline parameters within specified parts‑per‑million tolerances.

The Planning Commission approved the specific land‑cap wording amendment by roll call (six yes, one no, one abstain) and then voted to forward a favorable recommendation on the UDO with the commission’s amendments (six yes, one no, one abstain). The recommendations will be transmitted to the Jefferson County Commissioners for consideration.