bioenergy
Despite the arrival of summer and continuing disagreements over the state budget, Ohio legislators have been working on several pieces of legislation relevant to Ohio agriculture. All of the proposals are at the committee level but may see action before the Senate and House after the budget bill process ends. Here’s a summary of the ag related proposals currently under consideration.
Senate Bill 111 – Urban Agriculture
Senator Paula Hicks-Hudson (D-Toledo) targets barriers for farmers in urban settings in SB 111, which has had three hearings before the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee. OSU Extension, the Ohio Municipal League, and several farmers have testified in support of the proposal, which contains three components:
- Establishes an Urban Farmer Youth Initiative Pilot Program to provide youth between the ages of six and eighteen living in urban areas with programming and support for farming and agriculture. The bill would appropriate $250,000 over 2024 and 2025 for the pilot, to be administered by OSU Extension and Central State Extension.
- Exempts temporary greenhouses, such as hoop houses, from the Ohio Building Code, consistent with Ohio law’s treatment of other agricultural buildings and structures.
- Codifies the Department of Taxation’s current treatment of separate smaller parcels of agricultural land under the same farming operation, which allows the acreages to be combined to meet the 10 acre eligibility requirement for Current Agricultural Use Valuation.
House Bill 64 – Eminent Domain
A proposal to make Ohio’s eminent domain laws more favorable to landowners remains on hold in the House Civil Justice Committee. HB 64 is receiving more opposition than support, with dozens of parties testifying against it in its fourth hearing on May 23. Read more about the proposal in our previous blog post.
House Bill 162 - Agriculture Appreciation Act
Rep. Roy Klopfenstein (R-Haviland) and Rep. Darrell Kick (R-Loudonville) introduced HB 162 on May 1 and the bill received quick and unanimous approval from the House Agriculture Committee on May 16. The proposal would make several designations under Ohio law already recognized by federal law:
- March 21 as "Agriculture Day."
- October 12 as "Farmer's Day."
- The week beginning on the Saturday before the last Saturday of February as "FFA Week."
- The week ending with the second Saturday of March as "4-H Week."
House Bill 166 – Temporary Agricultural Workers
A bill addressing municipal income taxes for H2-A agricultural workers has met opposition in the House Ways and Means Committee. HB 166, sponsored by Rep. Dick Stein (R-Norwalk) would subject foreign agricultural workers’ income to municipal income taxes. The current municipal tax base in Ohio is based on federal tax laws that exclude foreign agricultural worker pay from Social Security and Medicare taxes since the workers cannot use those programs, and HB 166 would remove that exclusion and add H2-A income to the municipal tax base. The bill would also require employers to withhold the taxes for the municipality of the workers’ residences. While municipal interests support the bill, Ohio Farm Bureau and other agricultural interests testified against it in its third hearing on June 13. Opponents argue that H2-A workers are not residents because they are “temporary,” that the proposal would have many potential adverse effects on how Ohio handles the H2-A program, and would hamper the ability of agricultural employers to use the H2-A program to hire employees.
House Bill 193 – Biosolid and biodigestion facilities
Biosolid lagoons and biodigestion facilities would have new legal requirements and be subject to local regulation under a proposal sponsored by Rep. Kevin Miller (R-Newark) and Rep. Brian Lampton (R-Beavercreek). HB 193 would grant county and township zoning authority over the lagoons and facilities, require a public meeting and county approval prior to seeking a facility permit from the Ohio EPA, require the Ohio EPA to develop rules requiring covers on new biosolid lagoons, and modify feedstock requirements for biodigestion facilities to qualify for Current Agricultural Use Valuation property tax assessment. HB 193 had its first hearing before the House Agriculture Committee on June 13.
House Bill 197 – Community Solar Development
A “community solar” proposal that did not make it through the last legislative session is back in a revised form. HB 197 proposes to define and encourage the development of “community solar facilities,” smaller scale solar facilities that are directly connected to an electric distribution utility’s distribution system and that create electricity only for at least three “subscribers.” The bill would establish incentives for placing such facilities on distressed sites and Appalachian region sites through a “Community Solar Pilot Program” and a “Solar Development Program.” Rep. James Hoops (R-Napoleon) and Sharon Ray (R-Wadsworth) introduced the bill on June 6, and it received its first hearing before the House Public Utilities Committee on June 21. “The goal of this legislation is to create a small-scale solar program that seeks to be a part of the solution to Ohio’s energy generation and aging infrastructure need,” stated sponsor Hoops.
House Bill 212 – Foreign ownership of property
Ohio joins a movement of states attempting to limit foreign ownership of property with the introduction of HB 212, the Ohio Property Protection Act. Sponsored by Representatives Angela King (R-Celina) and Roy Klopfenstein (R-Haviland), the proposal would prohibit foreign adversaries and certain businesses from owning real property in Ohio. The bill was introduced in the House on June 13 and has not yet been referred to a committee for review.
Tags: legislation, urban agriculture, eminent domain, employment, H2-A, tax law, Income Tax, cauv, biosolids, bioenergy, Zoning, solar, foreign ownership
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The siting of renewable energy projects on Ohio farmland is a divisive issue these days, pitting neighbors against neighbors and farmers against farmers. Some support expanding renewable energy capacity while others oppose losing productive farmland or changing the rural landscape. A common question arising in this conflict is this: when can a county or township say “no” to a proposed renewable energy development? Several new laws, old laws, and recent court cases can help answer this question, although the answer is not always clear.
The “public utility exemption” from zoning. A long-standing provision of Ohio law that limits county and township land use power is the “public utility exemption” from zoning. Ohio Revised Code Sections 303.211(counties) and 519.211 (townships) specifically state that counties and townships have no zoning authority “in respect to the location, erection, construction, reconstruction, change, alteration, maintenance, removal, use, or enlargement of any buildings or structures of any public utilities.” The historical reason for this exemption is to keep local regulations from interfering with the provision of public utility services to Ohio residents. But what is a “public utility”? The exemption does not define the term, leaving Ohio courts to determine what is and is not a public utility on a case-by-case basis. More on that later.
New powers in Senate Bill 52. Effective in October of 2021, Senate Bill 52 gave new powers to county commissioners over certain renewable energy developments, setting aside the “public utility exemption” in those situations. The new law states that counties can designate restricted areas where wind and solar development is prohibited and can prohibit an individual proposed wind and solar facility or limit its size. These new powers, however, apply only to facilities with a single interconnection to the electrical grid and beyond a certain production size. For solar facilities, that size is 50 MW or more of energy production and for wind facilities, it’s 5 MW or more. Facilities that aren’t connected to the grid or are beneath those amounts are not subject to the new powers granted in S.B. 52. Additionally, facilities that had reached a certain point in the state approval process aren’t subject to the new law. Several Ohio counties have already established restricted areas or worked with townships to determine whether the county will approve individual projects as they come forward.
Authority over “small wind farms.” New wind power development in Ohio a decade ago led to the “small wind farm” provision in Ohio Revised Code Sections 303.213 (counties) and 519.213 (townships). This law allows counties and townships to use their zoning powers to regulate the location and construction of publicly and privately owned “small wind farms,” regardless of the public utility exemption. A “small wind farm” is any wind turbine that is not subject to Ohio Power Siting Board jurisdiction, meaning that it produces less than 5 MW of energy. Some counties and townships have utilized this provision of law to establish setback distances for wind turbines in residential areas.
The “bioenergy” exemptions. Yet another Ohio law limits county and township zoning authority over bioenergy facilities. Found in the “agricultural exemption from zoning” statute, Ohio Revised Code Sections 303.21(C) (counties) and 519.21(C) (townships) states that county and township zoning cannot prohibit the use of any land for biodiesel production, biomass energy production, electric or heat energy production, or biologically derived methane gas production if the facility is on land that qualifies as “land devoted exclusively to agricultural use” under Ohio’s Current Agricultural Use Valuation program and if, for biologically derived methane gas, the facility does not produce more than 5 MW or 17.06 million BTUs of energy. Ohio now has several facilities that fit within this exemption from zoning authority.
Two recent cases examine when a renewable energy facility a “public utility.” The “public utility exemption” from county and township zoning was at issue in two similar Ohio cases concerning biodigesters, facilities that process manure and other solid wastes into methane gas that is used to generate electricity. The most recent is Dovetail Energy v. Bath Township. The township claimed that the Dovetail biodigester located on farmland in Greene County was an “industrial use” that violated township zoning regulations. The owners argued that the biodigester was exempt from township zoning under both the “public utility” exemption and the “bioenergy” exemption.
The case reached the Second District Court of Appeals, which focused a large part of its analysis on the issue of whether the biodigester is a “public utility” that is exempt from township zoning under Ohio Revised Code 519.211. Relying on earlier cases from the Ohio Supreme Court, the court explained that an entity is a public utility if “the nature of its operation is a matter of public concern” and if “membership is indiscriminately and reasonably made available to the general public” as a public service.
The court analyzed the “public service” and “public concern” factors for the Dovetail biodigester, examining first whether Dovetail provides a public service, which requires a showing that the facility indiscriminately provides essential goods or services to the public, which has a legal right to demand or receive the goods or services, and that the goods or services can’t be arbitrarily withdrawn. Because Dovetail generates electricity that is sold into the wholesale energy market and used to provide energy to local utilities and customers and because Dovetail is also required to provide renewable energy credits that it cannot arbitrarily or unreasonable withdraw, the court concluded that the facility is a “public service.”
Factors determining whether Dovetail’s operation is also a matter of “public concern” that the court analyzed included whether Dovetail “serves such a substantial part of the public that its rates, charges and methods of operation become a public concern.” The court looked to Ohio’s incentives for renewable energy development, the lack of competition in the electric grid, the “heavy” regulatory environment for Dovetail, and its payment of public utility taxes as indications that Dovetail and the energy it produces are “public concerns.” Meeting both the “public service” and “public concern” components, the appeals court agreed with the lower court’s ruling that Dovetail is a public utility and is exempt from Bath Township zoning regulations.
The Dovetail decision echoes an earlier decision in the Fifth Appellate District, Westfield Township v. Emerald Bioenergy, where the appellate court examined a biodigester on farmland in Morrow County and found that the township could not regulate it because it is a “public utility.” The court cited factors such as Emerald’s provision of electric to the general public through interconnection agreements that distribute the energy to the energy grid, its lack of control over which customers receive or use the energy, its renewable energy credit requirements that can’t be arbitrarily or unreasonably withdrawn, its acceptance of waste from any customer, its governmental regulations and oversight, and its public utility taxes. The court also noted that it need not address the “bioenergy” exemption because it found the enterprise to be a “public utility.”
Both townships in the Dovetail Energy and Emerald Bioenergy cases requested a review of the decision by the Ohio Supreme Court. But the Supreme Court decided not to hear either case, although several of the justices dissented from that decision in each case. Without further review by the Supreme Court, the appellate court decisions stand.
What do these cases mean for solar energy facilities under 50 MW? Recall that S.B. 52 allows counties to prohibit or restrict solar facilities that are 50 MW or higher, but no other law addresses solar facilities with a single interconnection point to the energy grid that produce less than 50 MW. Would such a facility be a “public utility” under the public utility exemption? As with Dovetail and Emerald, a court would have to examine the solar facility and determine whether “the nature of its operation is a matter of public concern” and if “membership is indiscriminately and reasonably made available to the general public” as a public service. If so, a county or township could not use zoning to prohibit or regulate the location or construction of the solar facility.
Learn more about renewable energy laws in the Farm Office Energy Law Library at https://farmoffice.osu.edu/our-library/energy-law.
Tags: renewable energy, solar energy, wind energy, bioenergy, Zoning, Senate Bill 52
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Proposal would ensure that on-farm bioenergy activities qualify for CAUV and are exempt from zoning regulation.
A legislative proposal in the Ohio House of Representatives would include on-farm bioenergy production activities in two key provisions of Ohio law: qualification for differential tax assessment under the Current Agricultural Use Valuation program and exemption from local zoning authority. Representatives Pryor and Domenick introduced House Bill 485 in mid-April with assistance from the Ohio Department of Agriculture. The bill was referred to the House Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee, but no other action on the bill has taken place.
The proposal addresses "biodiesel production, biomass energy production, electric or heat energy production and biologically derived methane gas production" where at least 50% of the starting material or feedstocks are from the same tract, lot or parcel on which the energy production takes place. This 50% requirement targets on-farm energy production, where a farm is producing and processing the energy inputs, as long as no more than 50% of the supplementary inputs derive from other properties.
The bioenergy production activities that meet the 50% rule would be included in the CAUV' program's definition of "land devoted exclusively to agricultural use" in ORC 5713.30, thus guaranteeing eligibility for the CAUV property tax rate. The bioenergy production activities would also become part of the definition of "agriculture" for purposes of county and township zoning, ORC 303.01 and ORC 519.01. Because counties and townships have limited zoning authority over "agriculture," the proposal would ensure that a county or township could not use zoning authority to prohibit the qualifying bioenergy production activities.
H.B. 485 is available online, here.
Tags: agricultural zoning, bioenergy, biofuels, cauv
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