Planning Commission

Okay,

Park? I'm here. Commissioner Martinez? I am here. And Chair Reed?

Here.

Thank you.

Could we please have the agenda status report?

Good morning, chair and commissioners. We have one item on the standard agenda, which is the continued item of the utility scale solar amendments project and staff is ready to present on that for our continued discussion. I can move to the projection report Mr. Chair?

Please.

Our next scheduled hearing is going to be on May 27th and that will be here in Santa Barbara At a prior hearing, we canceled the hearing of May 13th. So we will not reconvene until May 27th and that will be here in Santa Barbara and that will be on that item or sorry that date is the continued item of Chick-fil-A and also we have an appeal of a parcel map on that date as well.

Looking further down the projection report after the May 27 hearing We have June 3rd is our next hearing. There's two items on that date, a request for a vesting determination by the B Rock quarry and then we have long-range planning presenting the five year capital improvement program and comprehensive plan conforming to determination. That will be here in Santa Barbara on June 3rd.

Following June 3rd, we will meet in Santa Maria on June 10th for two items. The next hearing will be on June 24th and returning to Santa Barbara. And then after June 24th, we will have a hearing on July 1st and that will be here in Santa Barbara. As of now there are no further items projected for the rest of the year but I'm sure we'll fix that.

All right thank you And now we come to the time designated for public comment. This is available for members of the public that would like to make comment on any item not on today's agenda. So Mr. Villalobos, do you have any speaker slips or hands up?

Thank You Mr. Chair I have received no speaker slips and for those of you joining us online if you'd like to speak during this portion of the hearing go ahead and raise your virtual hand and I'll call on you. No hands raised

No hands. OK, so let's move ahead to Planning Commissioners' Informational Reports. These are reports from individual commissioners on planning issues, seminars, meetings, and literatures or any other item of interest that they feel would be appropriate for the commission.

Commissioner Park? Actually, I have a question about the projection report but we're moving along so fast. Oh go ahead. I wasn't able to ask

it.

On the projection report it shows that on the June 10 hearing and the development plan permit for the transfer of the asphalt refinery has been two-and-a-half hours what is that likely? I've been asked to meet with some Straus Wind Energy people that afternoon and I'm just wondering if that's doable thing

Commissioner Park through the chair, we are estimating that because past experience on these type of things has generated a lot of public comment. So that's why it's set at two and half hours just as a conservative approach for the time that you might have for public comment. So it's a change of ownership. It's pretty straightforward as far as the staff presentation and review of the commission but there could be some public comment

because it's related to oil, is that a concern? Okay. All right thanks.

No other informational reports? Commissioner Martinez.

Yes good morning everyone I thought a good piece of information I don't know if you've all heard about the San Luis Obispo ruling against the oh my gosh Coastal Commission We recognize the powers of actually local planning being what it's solely zoned for, unless it's of some peculiar natural interest. But a good read in regards to resistance against the Coastal Commission.

Okay, I have one. I have acquired a property outside of the county and will be relocating there so my last meeting as a commissioner will be May 27th. Sorry to do that to you at a time we have another vacancy But yeah, I have some family issues that really need to be tended to. It's not like I'm going to disappear the ranches are still gonna be here. I'm still gonna be dealing with those and other issues relative to them but just the situation necessitates my being there physically and it's not in the county so this has been a great experience and we can talk a little bit more about it at our next hearing on the 27th Thank you for your understanding on that one.

Losing two important members, that's tough. But we're really happy to have had you on the commission. It's been very... Well you certainly dove in but we'll talk about more of that on the 27th. You've really grasped the issues and been such an important contributor to this process. So, I do have an announcement. We have had a instance of fraud at the county.

There have been emails going out to our applicants requesting payment and in some cases even including wiring instructions. And my name is attached to the email so there are fraudulent invoices that are going out So what I want to do is just announce if people are listening to this, do not open the attachments. And I want to reassure our customers that we are addressing it and we already have the DA and the sheriff involved to investigate it. It has happened in Paso Robles they had the same thing happen so these whoever is generating the fraud is targeting different agencies If people are seeking to make payments, they need to go online to our secure payment portal on our official website.

And just making sure that people stay informed on scam prevention is really important like weird emails or misspellings or things like that are telltale signs that they're fraudulent and so you really have to read the email address So make sure when you get something that is actually coming from countyofsb.org and hopefully we can, nobody will pay. We've gotten a lot of emails from upset applicants about what's happened thinking that they were valid and why would I email them such a ridiculous email? But hopefully we'll get it under control and we'll find who the culprits are but that's probably pretty challenging.

The other thing I want to mention is that yesterday we were at the Board of Supervisors with the local preference item. It was, it was to be a second reading but Council felt there was enough change in the ordinance that we should bring it back as another departmental item which we did. During the hearing an item was raised by Supervisor Caps through a letter that had come from a member of our Building Industry Association about wanting to understand occupancy and learn about who is renting these units or buying these units. So, we included a provision in the regulations that say the developers shall report at 90% occupancy where their tenants are coming from Whether they're people that were working here and living outside the county or people working on the South Coast and living on the South Coast, or people from outside the community that aren't working, weren't working, are living here.

So it's just data gathering to give us some information about how successful these marketing plans are. We are limited in the kinds of things we can require, particularly for market rate housing given the fair housing laws but we want to collect the data and learn about what's happening with the units that were building as part of our housing element process.

And then future board items, we have a briefing on the 12th which is next week on future ministerial permits, so we are working to streamline aspects of our code and reduce permit requirements for certain residential accessory uses homes and small commercial projects. This is just a briefing to get guidance from the board to make sure we're on the right track and then once we get that We will be coming back through the Planning Commission and the board before the end of the year with that proposal And the oil and gas item which is going to prohibit the drilling of new wells is going to the board on the 23rd of June.

And that's all I have, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Looks like no questions. All right thank you. We can proceed to our standard agenda. We have a waived public hearing.

Chair and Commissioners, that's for notification purposes only no action needed on that item.

Okay thank you so could you read in the first item Mr. Villalobos?

Yes thank you Mr. Chair. The following is a hearing on the request of the County Santa Barbara Planning and Development Department at the County Planning Commission consider the following case numbers 24 ORD 28 and 29 As well as case numbers 26GPA5 and 26GPA6.

Good morning Mr. Chair, members of the commission Alex Tuttle with Long Range Planning and I'm joined with me Today, Zoe Carlson, Project Planner. Matt Hernandez and Whitney Wilkinson, Supervising Planner. As you recall this project was first heard by your commission back in March. You sent us off with some direction from that hearing. We're back to you today in response and to provide some information in response to that direction.

With that I will hand it off to Zoe to present. Thank you.

Good morning, Chair Reed and Commissioners. My name is Zoe and Matt Hernandez on our team will be presenting with me again today. We'll start by reviewing the direction we received from your commission and discuss the Clean Coalition recommendations as well as potential changes to the amendments. We'll also discuss some options to further restrict utility-scale solar projects including a countywide cap, and will then conclude with a summary of options before your commission As well as recommendations to move this project forward to the Board of Supervisors.

We presented the draft amendments to your commission on March 11th, and you directed us to address recommendations that were included in the Clean Coalition letter excluding recommendation number four as well as evaluate potential caps specifically for utility scale solar those largest projects. And that's specifically in order to be protective of agricultural resources.

You also asked us for additional discussion on alternatives related to the CEQA document, the Programmatic Environmental Impact Report. Staff evaluated the recommendations that were included in the Clean Coalition letter and identified several changes that could be made to the ordinances in response to those recommendations. And the first set of recommendations were related to avoiding new restrictions on behind-the-meter projects And in response we are bringing option to combine Tier 1 and the previous Tier 2 category from March that previously required a zoning clearance for projects that were up to five acres on developed or improved land.

So under this expanded Tier 1 category, these ground-mounted solar systems that are up to five acres on developed sites would be exempt from planning permits. Staff has also included an option to exempt solar canopies of all sizes that are on developed sites as well for your consideration. The second set of recommendations was related to standalone battery energy storage systems.

And these types of facilities are not included because the direction from the Board of Supervisors was specifically to increase opportunities for solar development and not battery energy storage systems. Staff has, however, included an option for the commission to consider to allow an additional quarter acre of battery energy storage systems that are combined with solar projects within that Tier 1 system. So that means that a paired project would be allowed up to 5.25 acres to account for that additional quarter acre of battery energy storage, an alternative for your commission would just leave that at the five acres limit for a tier one for those solar plus battery energy storage. So something for your commission to consider today.

Finally in response to the last set of recommendations from the Clean Coalition, we did amend some definitions to clarify that projects may occur on multiple contiguous parcels as well as the methods to determine the overall footprint calculation are the same across all tiers. So this table shows this expanded Tier 1 permitting system and the building integrated or roof-mounted systems that we presented as previously being exempt from planning permits would continue to be exempt from planning permits regardless of size, no changes there.

Similarly, the ground mounted systems on undeveloped areas up to half an acre would continue to be exempt or require a coastal development permit if they were in the coastal zone. And that's the same as what we presented to your commission in March. Our proposed changes is to expand for the allowance of solar canopies with no limit on sizes as long as they are within existing developed or improved lands.

Similarly, ground-mounted solar systems on developed or improved sites would be allowed up to five acres And for agricultural resource zone properties, these systems would be primarily for on-site use to be protective of these zones and the site specific considerations there. And something to keep in mind is that all of these types of projects would be exempt from planning permits, but they would still require building permits and electrical permits. All other permits that would be required for these facilities.

Also, in March we presented a set of development standards for Tier 2 systems and we've rolled those development standards up into these Tier 1 systems to continue to be protective of resources as appropriate. This slide shows the revised tier two and three framework for community scale as well as utility scale solar facilities. The permitting requirements for these facilities has not changed. It's the same as what we presented before your commission in March.

The community scale facilities would still require a minor conditional use permit, and the utility scale solar facilities would still require a major conditional use permit. The only difference is instead of these being Tier 3 and Tier 4 they're Tier 2 and Tier 3 so And that's because we eliminated the previous Tier 2 category. We didn't receive any direction from your commission or any comments from the Clean Coalition on those Tier 2 community scale solar projects that are up to and including 30 acres.

And Matt will now talk us through some of the changes that your commission requested us to bring forward as options to those larger Tier 3 utility scale solar projects that are greater than 30 acres.

Thank you, Zoe. This slide highlights that utility-scale solar development would be constrained by several regional and site-specific factors. This map helps illustrate one of those major constraints—proximity to transmission lines and to substations. While zoning may allow utility-scale solar in certain areas, development potential greatly depends on whether a project can connect to the grid in a cost-effective manner.

Other constraints would also affect where projects could realistically be developed. These include topography and other site conditions, environmental and cultural resources, geotechnical conditions and natural hazards. In addition all utility scale solar projects would still require discretionary approval and a CUP meaning that each utility scale project would come before your commission and be reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

Overall, the distribution of Tier 3 utility-scale solar would be constrained by transmission access, site-specific constraints, and the county's own discretionary review process. So this slide further highlights another existing constraint on utility-scale solar development that is the extent to which grazing lands are in agricultural preserves. This map uses the state farmland mapping and monitoring program's grazing land classification, which is shown in yellow.

This does not necessarily indicate that all mapped lands are actively grazed today. Additionally, agricultural preserves are shown in green crosshatch only where they overlap with grazing land in the unincorporated county. This comparison was highlighted as grazing lands are generally the more likely agricultural lands to be developed for utility-scale solar due to their lower value and agricultural output.

However, as the figure shows about 62% of grazing lands are enrolled in agricultural preserve programs. Therefore large scale solar facilities would further be constrained based on the current proposed limits on solar development on contracted land. Solar developments greater than 100 acres on these lands would require Williamson Act contract cancellation which includes associated findings and additional financial penalties.

So to conclude, a significant portion of grazing land that is most likely to support solar development is already constrained before considering a formal acreage cap. At the last hearing, your commission directed staff to evaluate options for a countywide cap on utility scale solar acreage. The goal of the cap would be to provide some guardrails to balance renewable energy development with the protection of agricultural resources.

In developing these cap options, staff considered current countywide electricity demand, anticipated future growth in electrification and the County's Climate Action Plan targets. For your consideration we looked at the acreage needed to supply countywide electricity demand. As shown in the table an 8000-acre cap would meet roughly 100% of current demand accounting for only about 1% of agriculturally zoned land And increasing the cap to 16 or 24,000 acres would allow for 200% to 300% of current demand to be met helping account for future growth and electrification.

These numbers show that even a relatively small percentage of agricultural land if developed with solar could support a significant share of the county's energy needs. To reiterate these options serve only as reference points and the commission could select an alternate acreage amount This slide summarizes two alternatives that could further limit utility-scale solar development in sensitive areas.

The first is a coastal zone prohibition, which would remove the potential for Tier 3 utility scale solar on approximately 59,000 acres in the unincorporated coastal zone. This alternative was identified in the program EIR as the environmentally superior alternative. It would also preserve opportunities for smaller scale coastal solar, but would also somewhat limit the county's ability to meet its renewable energy goals and would still not on its own reduce all impacts to less than significant levels.

The second option which was not included as an alternative in the program EIR is a more targeted approach and prohibit utility-scale solar within the Gaviota Coast Planning Area. This option focuses on protecting the area's agricultural, visual and coastal resources while maintaining more flexibility elsewhere in the coastal zone. As a reminder, the Gaviota Coast Planning Area covers both coastal and inland areas which is why the acreage is larger.

The commission could also consider allowing utility scale solar on existing industrial or oil and gas sites within these areas where impacts may be a bit more limited. At the last hearing, your commission discussed allowing utility-scale solar on two existing oil and gas processing facilities along the Gaviota Coast. These sites, Mariposa Arena and Las Flores Canyon are already developed and have historically supported energy related uses.

As noted previously, the commission could consider allowing utility scale solar on these existing industrial sites even if broader prohibitions are allowed in the coastal zone or Gaviota Coast planning area. These locations may be well suited for solar development as they could minimize additional impacts while still maintaining a similar type of energy-related use.

This option provides a more targeted approach, balancing protection of both coastal and agricultural resources. This slide summarizes the policy options that are available for the Commission's consideration as part of today's discussion. These items are intended to function as a menu of individual decision points, allowing the commission to provide direction on each of the specific components of both the ordinance amendments and environmental alternatives.

The first issue relates to the proposed Tier 1 modifications that stem from the Clean Coalition's recommendations. This includes expanding exemptions for solar canopies and certain ground-mounted solar projects. There is also an option to expand acreage allowance for battery energy storage systems for both paired solar and storage systems by a quarter-acre.

The second issue pertains to whether or not to establish a countywide acreage cap for utility scale solar, or tier 3 projects. If so, we're requesting that the commission provide a specific acreage for this cap. And finally, whether to prohibit Tier 3 utility-scale solar in the coastal zone or Gaviota Coast Planning Area and whether targeted exceptions should be considered for existing industrial or oil processing sites at Mariposa Arena and Las Flores Canyon.

Staff is seeking direction from the commission on these items prior to forwarding recommendations to the Board of Supervisors. And to close, staff is recommending that the commission forward the project to the Board of Supervisors with approval incorporating any changes or options selected by the Commission at today's hearing. This includes making the required findings for approval including CEQA findings and recommending that the board also make those findings.

Staff is also recommending that the commission recommend board certification of the Utility Scale Solar Amendments Program EIR and adopt resolutions recommending board approval of the proposed amendments to the LUDC-CZO land use element in Coastal Land Use Plan as revised today. That concludes our presentation, and we're now happy to answer any questions the commission may have.

OK, so questions from commissioners? Commissioner Martinez.

Yes, on your last slide you indicated that there's an additional 0.25 acres for battery so my question is is that 0.2 5 acres just complement like five acres of solar panels and then you can have point two five or Kenya five acres of battery plus point two five

Yeah, Commissioner Martinez through the chair. So that additional quarter acre would be for battery energy storage system to support the facility it could be it would have to be commensurate in size with the solar development so we're not specifying specifically how big the solar versus battery energy storage system could be. It could be that The solar was a little bit smaller than five acres and the battery energy storage system was a little bit more than a quarter acre. But it just gives a little bit additional allowance for battery energy storage systems that are supportive of solar development.

But can I go completely to the other way in regards to you have five acres of batteries plus 0.25 big acres of batteries?

They would have to demonstrate that it's commensurate in size.

I'm not understanding that part, commensurate in size. I understand

so...

Commissioner

Martinez to the Chair. I think the answer to that would be no. It has to be supportive of the solar. So the solar would be the primary dominant use and then the battery would be supportive of that as opposed to the other way around.

Okay, understood. So it can't be

solely battery? Could not be solely battery and could not be 75% battery and 25% solar. I don't know exactly where that cutoff would be but it really has to be secondary to the primary use of solar.

Okay, so commensurate is proportionate then too? Yes. Okay thank you.

Commissioner Park?

Yes, I have some questions and I can link them to the slides let's first go to slide 10 OK, there's an asterisk at the bottom option allow utility scale solar on two existing industrial oil sites. Are we at the point where we're defining what those sites are? I mean which exact parcels and those kinds of things? Let me explain why I'm asking. These sites are possibly important for solar sites for two reasons.

One, they may be abandoned or they may be obsolete and then there a location that's already been disturbed for solar in your excellent memo that was sent to us prior to this hearing it described those sites in that way but I also see it as the potential that there will be ongoing industrial activity at those sites, like Los Flores Canyon which is really outside of Santa Barbara County's control at this point, at least arguably.

And that those will have energy usage and it would be a positive thing for the county if that energy usage was not combustion of natural gas but the use of solar. And why does that matter? Because if the industrial sites already taken up the flat land, okay it's already occupied. by an ongoing industry, then in order to have supportive solar it might have to be on adjacent parcels which might not be as flat. So for example if you drive up into Los Flores Canyon which is mostly hidden from the road, you see a bowl so to speak and if one was going to have solar there the logical thing would be to have the solar on the hillsides especially ones with the southern exposure And so that's why I'm asking my question. Are we talking about these sites and perhaps adjoining agricultural parcels or just those specific site parcels, which might not be enough?

Commissioner Park through the chair, so Ms. Wilkinson just she's looking something up but she reminded me that Los Flores already operates under some type of conditional use permit I don't know exactly their permit type but they could already through their sort of current permit program come in and ask for some solar to support their permitted conditionally permitted use

But would that only be on the Lost Forest Canyon?

Well, I don't know enough about Lost Forest to know what the scope of their existing permit covers. Presumably it's just the parcel or the property shown in orange on this slide. So if that's where their current permit boundaries are, that's where the solar would have to be to support that use unless they were to seek to expand the permitted boundaries to adjacent properties.

So they could do that now through sort of the framework of their existing permit, through a revision or something of that nature.

That's what I was getting at regarding the expanse of that property. I know enough from looking at like Cal Topo and picking up ownership records that Exxon owns that site, Los Flores site is pretty big I don't know enough to know whether if there was to be solar out there, would it have to go beyond the site? That's what I'm getting at. Things that might have to go beyond the site to adjoining agricultural lands and the concern for me is that if we make an exception on utility scale solar so that under alternative free EIR either Gaviota Coastal The 100,000 acres or the coastal area don't allow solar that we might be shooting ourselves in the foot with regard to some benign and useful solar in the future.

Commissioner Park, through the chair. I also did want to add that we have development standards that would limit solar development on slopes that exceed 20%. So that's something to keep in mind. We have development standards that would prevent solar development on slopes that exceed 20% based off of our development standards.

So is what we're voting on, is it specific enough that it distinguishes for example this potential exemption for these two sites from any solar prohibition? Is it specific to those parcels? I don't know what we have right now. I have a memo that talks about these things in concept, but I don't know actually what I'm voting on. Not complaining.

Commissioner Park through the chair. Yeah you haven't seen the exact language because we haven't shared that with you yet because we're kind of waiting to see what direction we get at the hearing today and we have some draft language that we can pull up and kind of walk through How it would fit within the draft amendments as currently drafted that staff has prepared.

It was specific to the parcels, the APNs associated with Mariposa Raina and Lost Forest and was not going beyond that. There's always an opportunity to change that language, to make it more expansive. I guess I would caution you that the more carve-outs you start creating at some point you get well what's the point of prohibiting it in this area if you're just going to create all these exceptions?

In the law they call it the exception swallowing rule.

Exactly.

Heard that on my life.

So as you can see in this exhibit the majority vast majority of lost forests is in the inland area outside the coastal zone All of Mariposa Arena is within the coastal zone, but it's also a smaller property. So

envision this coming back before this commission again?

I do not

know you do not so we would we would today express our approval of certain concepts there be revision of that language in the draft and that would go directly to the board

Yes and depending on what direction we get from you, we have the opportunity to maybe take a little recess. Bring up the draft language so you can take a quick look at it and then we would send it on off to the board with your direction.

It's all right so I don't have to wordsmith today. So you've got Mariposa and Los Flores facilities. I'm even thinking of the coast what about Tejivas? It's basically a landfill and it'll be restored in some fashion Who knows what that will look like? It might be a potential site for solar. I mean, are we limiting ourselves just to these oil and gas facilities?

Commissioner Park through the chair. So we did get in touch with County Resource Recovery and Waste Division to see if they were interested in a carve out for Tahequs landfill. And they said they were not at this time. So we did kind of look into that and decided not to include it

Of course, if the board was interested they may take that as a good hint to reconsider. Let me move to slide 12 because this is a good follow-up to Mr. Tuttle's comments. This sets out options for us to consider but these aren't the only options. For example, if we said how about I have a question about the coastal zone.

Correct, and just a reminder too that what we're talking about with that prohibition is for utility scale. So that's greater than 30 acres so that would still provide an opportunity for like up to a 30 acre solar project that could support on-site uses or off-site uses.

Okay, and there was a slide with a map on it. I forgot its number. It was the one that had all the pretty colors.

Which one?

There you go. Well yellow, it's pretty. Where is Straus Wind Energy on that map? It's in the coastal zone on the yellow piece right near California's wonderful corner of Point Conception

Yeah I don't know exactly but it's somewhere in that area where the cursor is highlighted. In that yellow, yeah.

Okay and so if we excluded solar in the coastal zone it would be excluding it on that site right?

for a utility scale. dotted line represents the Gaviota boundaries. So it does more or less get, it picks up a little area north of Halama Road between Halama and Vandenberg Space Force Base but I'm not sure if that's within the area of Strasswind.

Oh so is that purple oh I see you know to get there you turn off on San Miguelito which I have more comments about the Strauss in this possible application, but I want to reserve that for deliberations. But I do have a question. The City of Carpinteria wrote a letter that I didn't exactly understand and I didn't exactly understand their first letter. That says more about me than them.

The second letter they're saying, well you know you follow up on recommendations from Clean Air Coalition and certain other letters but it didn't address our letter. And I thought well I didn't understand what you wanted in your letter. I think you wanted consultation and something else. But have you endeavored to respond to the City of Carpinteria's first or second letter. I think it's important we respond to the municipalities that are affected by these things, or at least show that we're reading their letters even if I don't understand

them.

Commissioner Park through the Chair. First off, we just did confirm with Aaron Briggs that Strass Wind is not within the Gaviota plan

area. Oh good thank you.

So that might simplify things. Secondly in regards to the City of Carpinteria letter, yeah they did talk about or make some requests about early consultation or coordination and frankly I'm just not sure what that looks like or what that would be you know we have a A very established permit process that provides opportunity, particularly with the CUP, provides a lot of opportunities for public review and input. Whether that's from another agency, another jurisdiction, member of the public, a neighbor.

And that happens at multiple points along the permit process both at the CEQA point as well as the public hearing and approval point so those would be the opportunities for the City of Carpinteria to participate and comment and review on the project. We have a very well described, some might say cumbersome permit process particularly at the CUP level so I would be reluctant to add another requirement on top of that, particularly just for one subset of projects.

I guess that would be my response to that. We're always happy to have conversations and engage with our neighboring jurisdictions but to establish any sort of formal consultation, I'd be a little reluctant to do that in the code.

Well we've all read the letter and you're making me feel smarter and you made a good response so thank you.

Yeah, Commissioner Park through the chair just wanted to make note that the first letter was submitted during the program environmental impact report process and was responded to as a component of that process.

Great thanks. That's enough questions for now. Commissioner Ford?

Thank you. First of all, I just want to thank staff for taking the time to help me understand this. Sort of complicated but I feel like I know a lot more now and also for expanding the Tier 1 which was a request by many members of the community and the Planning Commission so thank you. I was just wondering for me and for members of the public if perhaps you could just describe what's the difference between a minor CUP and a major CUP?

Commissioner Ford through the chair, I believe that primary difference is that the decision-maker for a minor CUP is the zoning administrator and of course it's the Planning Commission for the major CUP. Otherwise I think the findings are the same and it's a similar process.

Okay thanks.

Commissioner Martinez

Thank you. I was reading into just the options for the acreage cap and also on, I think it's number 12 about countywide cap on utility scale solar acreage. What do we look to in regards to those caps? And the reason I'm asking that is, is that I keep on hearing that the evolution of solar energy is becoming better and better as we go. And you know, I kind of acknowledge it, I do acknowledge it too when we first came out with satellite television, people put that big huge antenna in their backyard And now we're down to a little napkin maybe that goes on top of your roof, that can get better and even more reception. So what are you the staff looking to look at these?

Variables, I would say in relation to it because I'm interested in seeing that because I imagine as time would go by if we do something that's static today. It may become antiquated as we go down the line of better technology. We don't need as big a solar farms than we used to. Smaller can produce more. I'm just interested in that.

Commissioner Martinez for the chair. We, you know in coming up with this acreage is we really looked at current technology. We can't forecast what future technology might mean in terms of smaller solar to generate the same amount of electricity so we looked at current like conversion rates in terms of how much megawatts can you generate within a certain acreage And so that's how we came up with those formulas, just to meet current demand.

And then sort of factored that out if we wanted to sort of double that or triple that, recognizing that certainly the trend is towards electrification both at the state level certainly and then even nationally. So if there were interest in a cap, I think we would certainly recommend that you establish a number that gives some room, some maneuvering room. So that we're not in a situation of hitting that cap easily and quickly and then suddenly realizing that we want more solar generated That's not to say that the cap can't always be adjusted at a later date. That wouldn't be that hard to do, to increase the cap in the future by the board but I would just suggest that when you look at the cap in combination with fact that we have a CUP process and these other constraints that would all help to provide some guardrails on Concerns that were raised the last hearing in terms of sort of large-scale wholesale loss of our agricultural resources.

I think that the cap numbers that we showed, that even if you have a pretty generous cap That would provide say 200 or 300 percent of our solar needs Or electrical needs that we're still talking about a pretty small percentage Of our overall ag land

And what brought this to mind in regards to Commissioner Park, which indicated about wordsmithing is maybe there's some language we could include with it because that would give that flexibility to adjust from current technology to future technology. And what I'm thinking is let's just say we are going to ag land but the realization that we don't need that much ag land because technology has just exceeded what we originally thought That that would give us the onsite ability to recognize that and not just be polarized to just being stuck in the corner of saying well this is the wording we own and they're doing what we What we put into the language rather than giving you the ability to say, well, we need some adjustments here. And that's the key word I'm looking for is just the flexibility to adjust to this emerging technology and maybe something can be put in there to at least address it.

Maybe it's an annual review which I doubt you guys want to do an annual review in regards But biannual, I don't know. But I think it should be something that is looking prospectively into the future of saying it should be reviewed and not just left onto the shelf is what my concern is right there. And yeah, that's just my thought process. Thank you.

Okay, now one of the things I would like to go back to briefly Commissioner Park brought up the letters from City of Carpinteria and since they're unrepresented at this hearing. I would like to make certain that their comments have been taken into account and move forward or included in discussion at the board because it seemed to me from their first letter they had some concern that was these how these projects will actually tear from the PEIR I think we need to accommodate The concerns of a significant community as we move ahead with this.

Now, I'll get back to this. I can remember maybe Commissioner Park and Ford Kahn sitting back in the elementary school in the 60's looking at our little weekly reader looking at wind and solar and how that was going to be Thank you. I would like I'm comfortable with them and that's a developed area. I'd like to look more into the ag area. I think one of the answers you gave earlier with respect to what was the maximum acceptable slope for a solar facility, and that's about 20%.

Okay so I think what would be very useful to have, I don't have it here, Board of Supervisors might appreciate later. Is there a map available that shows the amount of available ag preserve and agricultural land is less than that 20%? By lining out the 20% grade, how much of this map we have in slide, well, the various maps. How much of that area is lost since it is an excess of 20%.

I just think that would be a relevant piece of information to have for people making the ultimate decision on how big a footprint we want in terms of your acreage cap. I know we spoke about that earlier and we looked at the total estimated output of the system as proposed, and we were looking at some reasonable caps. The reason I supported the caps is I spent a lot of time driving out through the San Joaquin Valley and we see more and more areas of solar farm, some small, some quite large all producing plenty of energy in them. Also certain that the people at Santa Barbara County don't really want that look for our county hence I think the need for some limitations on size And also my concerns, which I talked about California flats. So I think the inclusion of the cap is good but I just think it is additional consideration most people can look at 8000 acres or 100 acres they don't have a clue how large that really is in terms of visualing.