The Montgomery County executive and County Council are presently deciding whether to support two important local solar power projects. The projects will add clean energy to the grid in order to power our homes — and in so doing help the state shut down the toxic coal plants that harm our health and fuel climate change.
I don’t expect our county government to support solar, although it should. In Montgomery County today, solar is allowed on rooftops in suburban areas, which is great, but it is prohibited on almost all of the ground in rural areas, which is terrible.
(To get technical, solar is prohibited in the Agricultural Reserve on soils that are “Class II,” which is pretty much all the soil. A typical suburban Maryland backyard is soil Class II.)
We need to allow solar everywhere, not just in urban areas. The local restriction is an artifact of an outdated approach to farmland preservation. Back when the county zoning code was first envisioned, techniques to produce agriculture beneath solar arrays were not yet developed. Today, we know that we can graze sheep or grow crops underneath solar panels.
That is why several years ago, when I was a councilmember, I proposed a zoning change that would have allowed for modest solar projects in rural areas of the county when combined with agriculture. It was a great opportunity for the county to embrace the future and develop a new approach to the Agricultural Reserve that supports both agriculture and solar together.
Unfortunately, County Executive Marc Elrich and a majority of the council opposed the proposal. No matter how many times supporters explained the land would continue to be used to support agriculture, they listened to special interests that were fearful of change. Restrictions stayed in place; projects failed.
Since then, the Maryland Supreme Court has clarified twice that state law preempts local zoning ordinances from regulating power generation stations, defined as those that produce more than 2 megawatts of energy — enough to power several hundred homes. Montgomery County has no real jurisdiction over power stations larger than 2 megawatts.
Recognizing that legal doctrine, two rural property owners are leaping over the county’s prohibition and seeking a state permit for projects that use between 10-20 acres of land. They are coming under attacks and I salute their courage. The Maryland Public Services Commission, which must provide the permit, is holding hearings.
The county should not oppose these permits or insist that the state abide by the county’s prohibitive restrictions. Instead, county elected officials should acknowledge the importance of the state’s goals and admit that their approach doesn’t work.
As our local failed effort to permit solar demonstrates, the county has no business regulating the location of power generation. Ensuring adequate power and appropriate location siting must be a state responsibility.
Looking around Maryland and nationally, it is abundantly clear that local governments will not adequately weigh the benefits to the broader community when they consider these issues. Those failures add up: studies show how local opposition is holding back the clean energy transformation.
As the permit processes for the two solar projects move forward, I hope the Maryland Public Services Commission will approve them. The commission can certainly be mindful of the overall amount of land devoted to solar in the area, and keep it to a reasonable level.
The objections raised by opponents really don’t hold water, such as the criticism that solar will irreparably harm the soil quality. To the contrary, these projects can be developed so that they actually restore soil quality through topsoil preservation and native plantings.
By supporting the projects, the commission will be exercising its appropriate authority to manage the state’s power generation needs. The state legislature has clearly assigned that authority to the commission and not to local governments.
Let’s hope the County Council does the right thing and supports solar energy. Even if it doesn’t, we should all encourage the state to get clean energy projects moving.
Takoma Park resident Hans Riemer served as an at-large member of the Montgomery County Council from 2010-2022.
