What was the world’s largest solar farm is expected to begin shutting down next year, as Gov. Gretchen Whitmer ramps up efforts to expand solar energy in Michigan.

California’s Pacific Gas & Electric is asking regulators to end its contracts with Ivanpah Solar, which was celebrated as the largest solar farm when it opened on the California-Nevada border 11 years ago, according to the International Business Times.

“PG&E determined that ending the agreements at this time will save customers money compared to the cost of keeping them through 2039,” the company said in a statement.

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PG&E buys power from two of the plant’s three units, and those units would start shutting down in 2026, if regulators approve the plans.

The plant’s other customer, Southern California Edison, is in discussions with the U.S. Department of Energy and owners on a buyout for its contract, as well, The Associated Press reports.

The plant uses a solar thermal technology the involves about 350,000 computer-controlled mirrors the size of a garage door to reflect sunlight to towers, where heat from the sun’s rays boil water and drive steam turbines.

Newer photovoltaic technology has since become much cheaper, and the companies are moving on to save their customers money.

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“Solar voltaic panels and battery energy storage were once unaffordable at large scale,” said PG&E Senior Director Don Howerton. “Today, after years of sustained investment and improvement, those technologies provide thousands of megawatt hours of clean electricity for PG&E customers.”

Julia Dowell, spokeswoman for Sierra Club, described the Ivanpah plant as “a financial boondoggle and environmental disaster.”

“Along with killing thousands of birds and tortoises, the project’s construction destroyed irreplaceable pristine desert habitat along with numerous rare plant species,” Dowell told the AP. “While the Sierra Club strongly supports innovative clean energy solutions and recognizes the urgent need to transition away from fossil fuels, Ivanpah demonstrated that not all renewable technologies are created equal.”

In Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s Department of Natural Resources is facing similar environmental concerns over a plan to clear cut 4,000 acres of state forest to make way for solar development.

The plan, designed to move the state towards Whitmer’s goal of 100% “clean energy” by 2040 while generating revenues for the DNR, was set to start with a lease for 420 acres of state forest land near Gaylord that drew widespread public outrage.

“The more research I do on deforestation for the sake of solar, especially as you start to scale that up, and for thousands of acres, that seems really short sighted,” Lisha Ramsdell, associate director for Huron Pines, a Gaylord-based conservation group, told MLive.

The lost carbon sequestration from the trees cleared to make way for solar is only one of many impacts to consider, she said.

“Losing the trees is one thing, but you’re losing that biodiversity. You’re losing the habitat connectivity as well,” Ramsdell said. “And as you start to scale these up to into the thousands of acres, there’s potential compromise to our water resources, groundwater recharge areas. Our forest and our soil provide that filter system for our groundwater. And so those are all really important factors to be considered as well.”

Larry Leefers, a retired professor of forestry at Michigan State University, agreed there’s much better places for solar development than on state forests.

“This proposal to cut down a living forest that is sequestering carbon and replace it with solar arrays just doesn’t track very well with the way we manage for sustainability,” Leefers said.

While the retired professor and others with the Society of American Foresters who are tracking the issue are “certainly supportive of renewable energy – whether it’s solar or wind or wood or water – we would think that there would be better places to do this sort of thing,” he said.

“Because there would be the loss of hundreds of acres of habitat for wildlife and the other many benefits that forests give related to water, soil and wood products,” Leefers told MLive. “This just doesn’t seem like a very appropriate use of state forest land.”

MLive exposed similar concerns from others within the DNR, as well.

While lawmakers have called for DNR officials involved in the plan to be terminated and vowed to fully investigate, Sierra Club is defending the governor.

Michigan Sierra Club forest ecologist Marvin Roberson accused lawmakers of hypocrisy, arguing oil and gas pipelines, logging and other industrial activities have a bigger impact than the planned solar development.

“Their concern is only habitat loss for renewable energy,” Roberson told Bridge Michigan. “They’re fine with habitat loss for fossil fuels.”

Sierra Club previously endorsed Whitmer for governor, and she appointed Sierra Club organizer Justin Onwenu to the state’s Advisory Council on Environmental Justice in 2021.

“It’s disconnected from other state forest land,” Roberson said of the proposed lease near Gaylord. “It’s surrounded by residential and industrial development, and highways run through it…we’ve not been shy about criticizing the DNR for inappropriate use of public lands or lack of public accountability, clarification and public input. This, so far, does not rise to any of those.”

Regardless, the DNR was forced to pause the solar plans amid the public outrage, though the lease plans for the 420 acre site near Gaylord are moving forward.

“We just pushed the pause button to any other further considerations until we … bring this one to some sort of conclusion,” Scott Whitcomb, the DNR’s public lands director, recently told a Forest Management Advisory Committee.

In the meantime, conservation groups are demanding more transparency in how the DNR identifies potential solar leases, while lawmakers have vowed to more closely scrutinize the department’s solar strategy.

“Projects like this highlight the blatant hypocrisy within the DNR. You’re completely willing to jump into bed with the solar industry and the foreign powers controlling their purse strings but deny other smaller land-lease proposals without a second thought,” 50 state lawmakers wrote in a letter to DNR Director Scott Bowen. “You have a responsibility to be good stewards of public land – replacing forests with solar panels does not live up to that standard.”