![]() ![]() ![]() Yet, despite this resounding vote, on April 3, AMP and Cowls filed a lawsuit against Shutesbury, claiming that the new bylaw unreasonably restricts the companies’ ability to develop their industrial solar installations in the town. The site of the proposed project poses a particularly high risk as it is a 1,200-foot mountain whose watershed runs into aquifers that serve as residents sole source of drinking water and flows into a major reservoir that provides drinking water to Amherst. The intention of the bylaw was to protect our critical water resources from lithium-ion battery contamination and degradation by flooding, erosion, and sedimentation, which are likely consequences of clear-cutting for solar development. National and international experts insist that forest protection must be central to any climate change solution.Īt a packed Special Town Meeting in January, Shutesbury residents voted nearly unanimously to approve a comprehensive solar bylaw that introduces safety requirements for batteries in ground-mounted solar electric installations. Ironically and tragically, the whole purpose of implementing solar - to reduce our carbon footprint - will be undermined if we cut down our very best tools for large-scale carbon storage and sequestration: forests. ![]() Cowls use outdated laws to sue a municipality in pursuit of industrial solar development that would clear-cut hundreds of acres of important forest. Sadly, we are already seeing this play out as the multinational energy company AMP Energy and large landowner W.D. While we need to act promptly, the current extremely rapid pace of implementation is leading to exploitative practices that could set us back - or even reverse - our progress toward climate resilience. Massachusetts is moving faster than just about anywhere in the country to implement a clean energy economy, with the intention of adding as many as 2.5 million solar panels across the state in the next 20 years. ![]()
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