Squeaky Clean Energy Podcast Episode 114 (Summary and Transcript)
Solar energy is one of North Carolina’s most promising forms of renewable energy. There are nearly 39,000 residential, commercial, and utility-scale systems throughout the state. “Solar farms” are one form of solar energy production. These are large tracts of voluntarily leased farmland, which are financially advantageous for the landowners.
Despite all of the advantages, there are many misconceptions surrounding solar farms in North Carolina. For this episode of the Squeaky Clean Energy Podcast, we welcomed Tom Terrell, an experienced zoning attorney with Fox Rothschild. As a North Carolina native and farmer himself, Tom has worked on countless renewable energy projects, often directly engaging with local and state decision-makers.
Tom shared his experiences interacting with farmers and rural communities across the state, shedding light on the realities of these projects. Below is a full transcription of the latest episode.
Matt Abele
All right. So, Tom, before we get started, can you share a little bit more information about your background and your work at Fox Rothschild here in North Carolina and South Carolina?
Tom Terrell
Well, glad to do that. First, my experience at Fox Rothschild is a bit broader than that. I’m the co-chair of the zoning and land use section for all 31 of our offices throughout the country, but I am a native of North Carolinia. I have done work in land use in four states, North and South Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia. I’ve been doing zoning and land use for 39 years as an attorney, probably the last 25 years, it’s been my total focus. I would add to that, in 2012, I initiated and chaired the effort to rewrite the Board of Adjustment statute, for the first time in almost 100 years.
Then in the six years that followed that, I chaired the drafting committee for some of the years of the entire rewrite of all zoning laws in North Carolina. All that while I have had a tremendous involvement in land use, not just in solar, but in the mining industry, in the solid waste to industry, commercial industrial spaces, and more.
Matt Abele
So you, as we briefly mentioned during your introduction, have the unique experience of also managing your family’s farm and also have a solid understanding of the challenges and opportunities that presents. Can you tell us a little bit more about your background in the agricultural space?
Tom Terrell
I always love doing that, but I’ll keep it brief. We have had for 60 years; we have had a 752-acre cow calf operation for red angus beef cows. At any one time, we probably have about 125 brood cows and the number varies, but around 100 calves that we sell at market each fall. For those who understand agriculture, they might enjoy knowing that we do rotational grazing on some pretty high-quality fescue. It’s the only low-cost way to feed cows.
I know we’re going to get into the finances here, so I need to add. We own all of our equipment, but we still have trouble containing and managing all of our costs. For example, on a cow-calf operation, we still have to purchase $15,000 to $20,000 worth of hay for about five summer months when the hay where the grass is not adequate. Our fuel costs go up. We have electric fences around 752 acres.
It takes a lot of money to pay that electric bill. Repair costs go up for a lot of our older equipment. But I will say, to conclude this, you know I used to talk about fencing. I used to talk about the tractors. I used to talk about how you round the cattle up and do that. But now that I am writing all of the checks, I describe our family operation as how our family loses money, not the way in which we make money. I’m very sensitive to droughts, very sensitive to the hurricanes that are coming in and washing out our roads. It’s an ongoing struggle to keep that farm active.
Matt Abele
And these challenges are not something that are unique to just your family farm. So can you maybe talk about how these experiences apply to the experiences of other farmers that you’ve talked to throughout the state of North Carolina, especially now, you know, almost 25 years into 2025. And I know you’ve all have had your farm and your family for quite some time. So, how does that experience compare to other farmers that you’re talking to throughout the state of North Carolina?
Tom Terrell
Well, you know, Matt, that probably is the most insightful question that could be asked. The surprising answer is our experience in most cases does not equate. It does not compare. There is no such thing as a farm or a farmer as a singular concept, although we tend to talk about farmers and farming as if they had a common meaning. It’s sort of like saying somebody is a student in a school, which could be anything from a four-year-old in a church, sponsor kindergarten to a PhD candidate in astrophysics at MIT. It’s difficult to discuss them all under one category.
But, we are common. We’re at some point, we’re soon to sell our cattle operation. When I was growing up, we were surrounded by dairy farms. None of those dairy farms exist. I mean none of them that I knew as a child exist anymore. Most of the farms that I see and am aware of in the Peat Mart part of North Carolina probably really fall under the category of hobby farms even though they might make some money from it.
Now you go down east and it’s a very different economy. It’s a very different world for agriculture in the eastern part of North Carolina or the eastern part of South Carolina or Virginia. You have different soils. You have mostly flat terrain. You’re challenged more by streams and wetlands in that part of the state, but you tend to have row cropping. Whereas up here, we have lots of hills, deep topography, and you’re forced more into an animal husbandry type of situation.
Now, when you get down east, and this has been my experience when I’m out there with solar farms, 40 to 60% of the people who I’m discovering out there, you they look like they might be farmers because they own rural land, but the fact is they live in Raleigh or they live in Wilmington, and they just own the land that has been in their family. In some cases, that’s before the Civil War, but not a single one of them is a farmer. They might sell the hay from the land so they can keep it in agricultural exemption. If they had a chance, if there was water or sewer, public water and sewer nearby, they would quickly sell it for houses, but that demand is not there. So, they do the best they can.
In many cases, there’s a very strong emotional connection to that land. Some of these are people who actually who own it, who pick tobacco on that land. Last week, for example, I did a rezoning for a subdivision in the town of Pleasant Garden in Guilford County, and the woman who was selling her land grew up helping her dad, you know, tie the tobacco, hang it in the tobacco barn, plant the tobacco. She did this when she came home from school, but she’s getting $46 an acre now to rent her land to a farmer. This is where her money is. She has to sell it, and so she’s selling it for a low-density housing operation.
You know, I’ve given you a lot of information about how diverse agriculture is and how diverse and different the many different people are who we would say are farmers. But if I could make one point that I wanted people to hear it is this and that is in 2024 there is no such thing as the small family farm that raises and sells food and lives on the money they make at market. That is a myth. It has gone the way of the old country doctor with the solo office who makes house calls and does everything from set bones to delivering babies. You can’t find that person anymore. Every single small farmer I have known for decades is able to be a farmer because she is a nurse at the local hospital. He has a construction company or there’s other income coming in to pay the mortgage, pay for the equipment at far at tractor supply, pay for the kids’ education, and yes to buy groceries for that farm from the local food line.
Matt Abele
So, you know, it sounds like the financials and economics have been a primary driver of some of the loss of farmland that we’ve seen across the state versus, you know, for example, solar coming in and redeveloping all of that. So, let’s shift gears a little bit to talk about solar as an example. What are some of the primary concerns that you hear about when a potential solar project is on the horizon for a rural community in North Carolina?
Tom Terrell
I hear a lot of concerns when I come in, but let’s but let’s put keep solar in the proper context. When there is change about to be about to occur in the visual landscape, whether it’s a shopping center, a subdivision, a government building, a solar farm, people are upset because people cannot handle change. Now, if change is uncomfortable, especially if you have grown up there, but it’s more uncomfortable if you fall into the category of people I call the ”Just Cames”. North Carolina is full of the “Just Cames”. When you read the newspapers, and you would think they all now live in the suburbs of Charlotte and Raleigh, but they do not. They live in the outer provinces in all of our rural counties.
They may have had a background in steel in Pittsburgh. They might have worked in an automobile plant somewhere in Michigan, but somehow or another, for all different reasons, they end up in North Carolina. They have one, two, or three acres. It could be a stick-built home. It could be a double wide. They don’t go to a local church. They don’t take a local newspaper. They’re really not involved, but they have their little piece of land right there, and they now want to pull up the ladder and keep it that way because this is what they chose.
But, they cannot go to a public hearing about a zoning change and say, oh gee, I’m uncomfortable with change. Change is making me mad. So, they have to say something else. And it makes no difference what the use is. People will come in and they’ll say, oh my god, think of all the traffic, or oh, my property values will plummet, or I’ll enjoy looking out my kitchen window and seeing the bunny rabbits and the deer, or, oh my God, think of all the damage this project, whatever that project is, will do to streams and wetlands. That statement is because of an assumption that this developer doesn’t have to follow all the rules and laws that everybody else has to follow.
You hear those exact same things about solar farms. But solar is a little bit different. Since 2017, when Duke took over the supply chain here and started to decide who it was going to allow to build a solar farm, Duke set the rules and said, to be competitive, to get into our system, you have to have a huge solar farm. We no longer have the 50-acre five megawatt farms that everybody was basically okay with. Now you have you know 50-70 megawatt solar farms on anywhere from 600 to a 1500 acre tract. When it comes in this size people’s eyes get big, and they say oh what is happening, so this is has started a different awareness.
Now, I will be the first to tell you, people have an emotional attachment to that landscape. It’s emotional. They enjoy seeing trees. They enjoy seeing tractors. It hearkens back to the times when they grew up, even though they themselves aren’t farmers. They never have been; they never will be. It’s emotionally comforting to them that they see this. Now we’re starting to see a pushback of, I like seeing farms, I don’t like seeing a solar farm. Even if they know that the solar farm is going to be perfectly concealed, that has become more of the conversation in the last two or three years. There have been some counties that have made some regulatory changes in light of that.
Now, I will be the first to say, agriculture is a surrogate issue. A lot of people may not like Joe Biden, or they don’t like the people who were on the left side of the spectrum who are pushing renewable energy. Therefore, they don’t like solar farms. There’s no real connective tissue. There’s no real logic there. But nonetheless, you hear these comments made at public hearings, and it’s not difficult to piece together where they really are coming from.
As somebody who has to write farm checks, and, in fact, I have farm checks here on my desk as we speak, I’m a little bit resentful that people who don’t come out of agriculture, who don’t know the difference between a John Deere, a Kubota, and an Alice Chalmers tractor and still want to use me as their mascot. They want to parade me and others in this industry around at public hearings as though they really care about us when they don’t.
Matt Abele
I think you hit the nail on the head, especially when it came to the issue of seeing the size of these solar farms increase pretty dramatically here in North Carolina, and that potentially leading to more opposition than we have seen in the past. Although granted, I think it’s really important to contextualize for folks listening that solar still occupies a very, very small portion of farmland in rural North Carolina. According to NCSEA’s latest study, we’re up to about 0.28% of all farmland being occupied by solar and that’s compared to about 10% of farmland being redeveloped for low density housing. We’ll make sure to include a link to that report in the show notes of this episode.
I want to talk about the opposition. There definitely is a perception that opposition to some of these projects is becoming more pronounced and organized, and probably part of that is what we just talked about with the scale of these projects increasing. Is that perception around more organized opposition the case that we are seeing this more than previously here in North Carolina, or is it just that, a perception of what’s really going on the ground?
Tom Terrell
I think most is perception. I have not come up against organized groups. What I come up against is an organized neighborhood. They’re not dealing with the macro numbers, like you said, 10% going to subdivisions versus you know a fraction of 1% going to solar farms, that’s not their concern. Their concern is this land, my land, right here, right now. And commissioners who, and this is not unique to solar.
It is unique to the political process where you have one or two people who are screaming into the process. Those are the only people that the commissioners or the council members see and hear. Since they’re waving their arms because they’re mad, there is some logical conclusion that therefore there must be an issue when there really is not.
That’s when you start getting moratoriums when you start getting changes in the setbacks and the buffer requirements. Person County changed it one time so that you had to have something like 200 or 300 feet of vegetative buffers, even though you can fully screen it in 30 feet. It was just an angry, reactive, punitive measure. It was an overreach, but this is what you get. Bad policy in response to the political class not knowing how to keep these comments in context.
Matt Abele
What would be your advice to commissioners, for example, that are running up against this very loud vocal opposition from a small group of people in relation to maybe one or two projects that are under development in that county?
Tom Terrell
There is a problem, and again, this is not unique to solar, that property owners who are under contract to sell their land for development stay away from public hearings. My advice would be for the commissioners to find those owners and for those owners to find the commissioners and have a conversation. It is none of the commissioner’s business to decide what is the proper use of land for somebody in their county if that use of land is, number one, allowed in the zoning ordinance if it gets rezoned, and number two, if it is not demonstrably harming people.
I will go another step. The economics of solar are astounding. It varies depending on where you live and the demand, but you could lease your land for maybe $75 an acre per year to sell the hay from the grass that grows on your land. $75 an acre per year is not bad. It may be $150 an acre per year to lease your land to a farmer or some massive agricultural corporation to plant some type of crop on your land, but you’re leasing it.
Meanwhile, you could lease your land to a solar company for anywhere from $750 to $1,000. I’ve actually seen it over $1,000 before. I’ve seen it $1,500 an acre in Virginia. which is 10 to 14 times more than you can lease your land to somebody under any other circumstance. Now you tell me, why does a commissioner think he or she has any right to get involved in that property owner deciding the best use of their land under these circumstances? This is not Soviet Russia. Last I knew, this is the United States.
Matt Abele
Those economics are really compelling. If I was a landowner, I would be very intrigued to go down that pathway, especially from the perspective that this is not a permanent engagement that will completely alter the land forever in which you cannot return it back to its original agricultural use, like low-density housing development, for example.
Tom Terrell
I make those exact same points at public hearings. You are exactly correct. By the way, people ask me, would I want a solar farm on my land? And I say, hell yes. We have tried with three or four different companies, but we have a transmission landline that crosses our 752 acres. It’s a 500 kilovolt which is too large and powerful to cost-effectively build a substation to boost the power to get it up onto the grid.
Matt Abele
To your point around this really being a property rights issue, and landowners are voluntarily working with developers to reap the financial benefits of potential solar developments here. It’s not like these developers are coming in and running eminent domain on their property and just taking it away from them. Can you talk a little bit more about you know how projects under development are voluntary arrangements entered into by a landowner and just the extensive nature of contracting to ensure that landowners are getting their fair share while minimizing impacts on land?
Tom Terrell
I don’t always get to meet the landowners. I do meet a lot of landowners in these processes. I don’t know how many counties I’ve done solar in, probably 50 to 60. I have never met a landowner who basically says, give me that lease, show me where to sign my name.
It’s a myth that the solar companies are coming in and taking this land forcing these people to do something they don’t want to do. If you don’t want to lease your land, don’t do it. The fact is, it makes sense. Let me give you an example. I have had the opportunity to get to know and work with the management of the company ZVP. The company’s been around for well into the 1800s. They own thousands and thousands and thousands of acres of land, but they’re very good stewards of that land, and they have taken a lot of their timber interest and leased it for solar, precisely because of the economics. It is smart business.
They have the choice of planting trees and waiting 30 years for the return, or they can go solar and get a much higher amount now. So, what do you do? It’s good economics. It’s good business. It’s good stewardship. You know, if there is a blip in the market for two-by-fours, you know, I have yet to see it or read about it.
Matt Abele
I can attest to the hunger and demand from landowners to lease out their property for solar. I mean, we here at NCSEA are hearing from landowners nearly every day who are begging to get connected with developers for this opportunity because they see the financials of this. When we talk about finding a developer to work with, what should landowners and local elected officials be looking for in a reputable developer and EPC or engineering procurement and construction company, and what constitutes good community engagement to ensure all parties are satisfied throughout the process?
Tom Terrell
Two questions there. Let me take the first one. What should you look for in a reputable company? It’s interesting to me that most of the folks I deal with weren’t even born when I graduated from law school. It’s a very young group of folks, but they’re coming whether it’s generational or what, these are very good people. They actually work very, very hard. They are honest with the folks that they deal with. They’re very communicative. While I have had experiences with what I would call callus owners or developers in the solar space, they are an exception. You find them in every single industry. For the most part, in solar, you find folks who work cooperatively with the local governments. They are the people you want to be doing business with.
So, when you say EPC, you’re talking about the construction side. I’ve been doing this since 2012. I have done somewhere between 200 to 250 solar farms in four states. As a rule, EPCs do a very, very good job. I only know of one situation that I would call a disaster with the EPC. I don’t need to get into it here. But you get that when shopping centers are built or housing subdivisions. It’s nothing unique to solar.
The other question was community engagement. I’m one of very few zoning attorneys who attends neighborhood meetings. I’ve been doing it for decades. I find that when neighbors are shouting into that process, you need to know in advance: what are they going to say, who are they, what are their concerns? Just as it’s important for me as the attorney to articulate this project to decision-makers, I need to go out and put my feet on the ground. I tell the team that works and supports me, it’s malpractice not to do that. You have to be able to see it.
When we do community engagement, I have letters that I’ve written. I’ve been perfecting them over the years that are for solar anywhere from six to nine pages. They have images, they have maps, they have a quote from the comprehensive plan. I talk about the process. I go into property values. I go into how they’re built, why they’re built, so that the second people hear something is coming, they can navigate that change.
Some companies like to say, we’re going to put up a solar farm, but if you want to see how it affects you in three weeks, we will meet with those of you who want to meet with us. They’ll go to Google University and find stuff that people put out there in 2014. It has no application whatsoever, or it’s political, not scientific. Now their opinions have been formed, but my letters really are not about announcing the neighborhood meeting that we always have, but more about giving them the framework within which to understand the change that’s being proposed.
Matt Abele
Just maybe for some helpful context for folks that are listening in, could you maybe just describe the process of development and what it looks like from a community perspective and how you were involved in the process, kind of just starting from square one through steel going into the ground?
Tom Terrell
Yes. There are companies that go out and find sites. You have to know where there is not congestion in the lines, where there’s available space in the grid. Then they start, they get out the maps and start following those transmission lines through rural counties to see where they could find enough tracks of land adjacent to each other that they can put together for this. And sometimes they call them, they’ve gone out and knocked on doors. It is a very, very, very hard way to make a living.
These folks more often talk about the sites they could not put together than the sites that they could. Once they do that then a developer will look at it and assess it and then they will try to figure out in this location what would our cost be to develop a solar farm. That’s when I get engaged, and we start taking it through the local permitting process. We now have an entitled tract for a certain size solar project, and then they bid into the competitive procurement process with Duke. Or if you’re in Dominion’s territory, you are submitting to Dominion.
From that point on, you have to get a utility commission’s approval. You have to have your project reviewed by all these state agencies. If you get through that, if you do a conceptual project, then line up your financing. I mean, it could be anywhere from a three to six-year timeline just to go from raw land to panels being in a field, collecting sunlight and converting it to AC energy.
Matt Abele
So, for those listening in, if there wasn’t anything else that you gathered from that, there is a ton of due diligence that goes into developing these projects and a lot of work that goes in. These aren’t things that just pop-up overnight and are developed in a way that ensures they are good stewards of the land as well.
We could probably do a whole other episode on some of the developments that have been done in North Carolina with things like agrivoltaics and pollinator-friendly habitats on site. And we probably will do a future episode on that. But we’ve only got a limited amount of time with Tom here this morning. So, with that being said, you know what do you foresee bigger picture as some of the biggest challenges and opportunities moving forward for solar development in our state and region?
Tom Terrell
I’m glad for that question, although I wish I had a better answer. My crystal ball is somewhat clouded. I’ve been doing these since 2012-ish. I started out doing some megawatt solar farms. I have actually done some kilowatt farms. I did several years of the five megawatts, which was the gold standard for a while. I have seen companies move into North Carolina, move out of North Carolina.
I’ve seen a lot of regulatory changes. You know most of the changes we’re seeing are at the local levels. Now that farms have become bigger, we’re also seeing some state changes. For example, we’ve had legislation recently about decommissioning. You know, none of these changes have been predictable, long and advanced. They come on pretty fast. Right now, battery storage is a trend. We’re working on that. So vested rights is a huge issue. You still have counties telling you that you’re not vested in the project. So, you know those are the issues now, what they will be in 2025 or 2026. I don’t know. I look forward to knowing what they are, but change has been constant.
Matt Abele
Change has indeed been a constant. I feel like there’s quite a bit of change every six months or so between, as you mentioned, the regulatory and legislative updates at the federal and at the local level. But the solar industry has been very adaptive and nimble to stay on top of all of those changes. What that means for you is plenty of job security in the future as well. Well, you know Tom, I do really appreciate you taking the time this morning to share a little bit of your experience both as a farmer, but also as someone who is working very closely with a number of these projects that have moved forward in North Carolina.
I think this is incredibly insightful for those that maybe aren’t as close to the development industry in solar as you are. So, I appreciate you taking the time this morning and I’m hoping we’ll have you back on an episode in you know a year or so when some of these changes have been instituted to talk about how we’re keeping up with them. So with that being said, Tom, thanks so much for joining us on this episode of the Squeaky Clean Energy Podcast.
Tom Terrell
Matt, thank you for having me. It’s been a pleasure.
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