Wednesday, 01 June 2011 06:00

The Pitkin County Commissioners hold weekly work sessions on Tuesdays and bi-monthly public hearings on Wednesdays in the Plaza One building (next to the Courthouse) in Aspen.  Both meetings are televised live and repeated on locater CG12 TV.  Agendas are posted in the Aspen/Glenwood newspapers and on-line at www.aspenpitkin.com.   In this column, your District 5 Commissioner, George Newman offers his take on current matters.   You can reach him at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .   

SOLAR CODE UPDATE

Just as the BOCC has been revisiting the Land Use Code in regards to agricultural buildings and greenhouses (last month’s column), we have also asked staff to address public concerns about solar installations.  Once again, Pitkin County staff held a public roundtable discussion in Basalt including caucus members, solar installers and interested citizens.  The information gathered from these meetings has been processed, presented to the P&Z and to the BOCC over the past year.  We are now at the point of refining all of the recommendations and we hope the matter will appear on our regular BOCC public hearing agenda for a vote later this summer.

Initially, the County was asked to modify the Code to allow an increase in the height restriction for ground mounted solar collectors.  Current code limits the height of these structures to 10 feet, which can cause problems when heavy snow is on the ground.   Rather than address just this one issue, the Board felt it was important to revisit the solar code in its entirety to also address the issue of glare, and the prospect of neighborhood solar arrays as well as commercial solar farms.

To date, P&Z has held 4 meetings on this subject, including one joint meeting with the BOCC.  Based on the information gathered, County staff recommends increasing the height limit for ground mounted solar collectors to 12 feet on parcels of 80 acres or less and to 16 feet for parcels of 80 acres or more, the rationale being that, on larger properties, visual impacts on neighbors would be less.  Personally, I question the use of lot size as a gauge in this instance.  

Meanwhile, glare is an offsite impact that can affect neighbors of a property with solar panels, and will now be included under our “nuisance” section of the code.  When glare is determined to be a nuisance, the property owner will be required to mitigate the problem.  Solar installers are cognizant of this issue and are hopefully addressing it.  One solution is to install adjustable panels.  This would allow changing the angle of the panels to reduce glare and optimize the solar gain as the angle of the Sun changes with the seasons.  Other options for mitigation are also open to consideration.

P&Z also recommends staff review of almost all types of solar energy collectors.  This would require more staff time but, due to State law, there are limitations on what local jurisdictions may charge for solar review: $500.00 for residential, $1,000.00 for commercial arrays.  This then becomes a budgetary issue for our community development department.  While I feel it is important that public notice be given, perhaps a simpler review process could be devised, especially for small residential projects.  

The last major concern involves neighborhood and commercial solar farms.  Currently, zoning regulations only allow solar panels as an accessory use:  they are not allowed as a primary use on the land.  Staff proposes a one-step special review by P&Z for a neighborhood solar farm, while a full scale solar farm for the purpose of commercial electricity generation would require a more extensive two-step review.  Both reviews will include site specific standards.

Pitkin County’s ultimate goal is to encourage energy efficiency and lower our carbon footprint.  Our challenge is to accomplish this goal without over-regulation, but with sensitivity to the potential impacts on neighbors.  As always, any thoughts or comments you have on these issues are appreciated as we work through our deliberations.


George Newman writes a monthly column for the Crystal Valley Echo.  He welcomes citizen input.

 

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