OneEnergy Development, which wants to build a 5-megawatt solar farm on Green Bay’s far east side, couldn’t afford more expensive lease terms that city officials sought to balance opportunity costs, triggering the City Council Feb. 3 to give Mayor Eric Genrich the final authority to award the lease.
The city’s Finance Committee had asked OneEnergy pay $1,000 each year of a minimum 30-year agreement for every acre leased of city-owned land about 2½ miles from the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, and the rate would go up 2% each year. This was a $200 increase from the $800 amount that was written in a previous draft agreement. The committee had also previously upped the rent for all three years that the company would have to build out its solar farm, from $250 per acre annually in an initial version of the lease to $800, too.
“We can’t offer a higher lease rate,” said project manager Nolan Stumpf to the City Council, citing project costs without further information about the site and the desire to be cost-competitive with other utilities. “So the budgets are − I’ll just be frank − quite tight.”…