WOODLAND – The Woodland Town Council rejected a proposal to rezone a section of land north of town to M2 (manufacturing) from RA (residential/agricultural), essentially denying approval of a solar farm. 
 
 Newly sworn in councilman Cecil Harkey voted against the motion to reject rezoning the land, while council members David Cooper, Ron Lane, and Pat Liverman voted to approve it following public comments against the rezoning. 
 
 The Planning Board had recommended the property be rezoned to allow Strata Solar Company to build a solar farm off U.S. highway 258. 
 
 Three other solar farms were previously accepted by the town council, with one now in the process of installing solar panels. 
 
 The solar farm companies are seeking placement around Woodland because it has an electrical substation nearby where the solar power generated by the panels can be added to the electrical grid. 
 
 Strata’s proposal would have competed encircling the Woodland substation. 
 
 Later in the meeting, the Town Council voted for a complete moratorium on solar farms. 
 
 During the public comment period preceding the rezoning vote, citizens expressed distrust and fear of the solar panels. 
 
 Jean Barnes said she represented many citizens who rejected any more solar farms coming to the Woodland area and presented a petition to the council. 
 
 Barnes asked that any future solar farm requests be placed on a referendum so the citizens can make the decision. 
 
 Mary Hobbs has been living in Woodland for 50 years and said she has watched it slowly becoming a ghost town with no job opportunities for young people. 
 
 She said her home is surrounded by solar farms and is no longer worth its value because of those facilities. 
 
 She added that the only people profiting are the landowners who sell their land, the solar companies, and the electric companies. 
 
 The next speakers were Bobby and Jane Mann. 
 
 Jane Mann said she is a local native and is concerned about the natural vegetation that makes the community beautiful. 
 
 She is a retired Northampton science teacher and is concerned that photosynthesis, which depends upon sunlight, would not happen and would keep the vegetation from growing. She said she has observed areas near solar panels where vegetation is brown and dead because it did not receive enough sunlight. 
 
 She also questioned the high number of cancer deaths in the area, saying no one could tell her that solar panels didn’t cause cancer. 
 
 “I want to know what’s going to happen,” she said. “I want information. Enough is enough. I don’t see the profit for the town. 
 
 “People come with hidden agendas,” she said. “Until we can find if anything is going to damage this community, we shouldn’t sign any paper.” 
 
 Bobby Mann said he watched communities dry up when I-95 came along and warned that would happen to Woodland because of the solar farms. 
 
 “You’re killing your town,” he said. “All the young people are going to move out.” 
 
 He said the solar farms would suck up all the energy from the sun and businesses would not come to Woodland. 
 
 Strata then addressed the council and audience. Several company representatives, to include Beth Trahos, Sam Judd and Brent Niemann, spoke about solar farms. 
 
 They changed the plan to increase setback from the road and said the solar farm would be have substantial amounts of vegetation. 
 
 Trahos said solar farms are proven to be safe and exist next to homes. She said there are no negative impacts on property values statewide. 
 
 “A solar farm is a wonderful use for a property like this,” Trahos said. 
 
 The town would not benefit, from a tax base standpoint, from the solar farms because they are not located within the town limits, but only in the extraterritorial sections. 
 
 The only funding the town would get is approximately $7,000 per year for specialized training for the Woodland Fire Department in the event of an electrical malfunction at the solar plant. 
 
 Niemann said the only sunlight the panels use to generate power is that which hits them directly. 
 
 “The panels don’t draw additional sunlight,” Niemann noted. 
 
 The power generated would go directly into the electrical grid and would not reduce Woodland’s power bills. 
 
 “There are no toxic materials on site,” Niemann said. “This is a tried and true technology.” 
 
 Mayor Kenneth Manual called for the vote, which was 3-1 against rezoning the land (the mayor only votes in case of a tie). 
 
 The council later voted for a moratorium on future solar farms. 

 World leaders in Paris may have lauded the future of renewable energy, but in small-town America, all that solar hocus-pocus is still viewed with a healthy dose of slack-jawed cynicism. 
 
 The good burghers of Woodland, North Carolina, have successfully torpedoed plans for a solar farm, arguing the panels would suck up all the sun's energy, cause cancer and drive young people out of town. 
 
 Local councillors initially voted to reject a rezoning application that would have allowed the Strata Solar Company to build the farm near a highway north of Woodland, the Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald reported. 
 
 But then they went further, supporting a complete moratorium on new solar farms, after residents made their opposition crystal clear. 
 
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 Link No more for Woodland: Solar panels in South Carolina. Photo: Wikimedia Commons 
 
 Jane Mann, a retired science teacher, reportedly told the council meeting she was concerned the panels would prevent photosynthesis and so stop the growth of nearby plants. 
 
 She said she had seen areas near solar panels where the plants were brown and dead due to lack of sunlight - a claim rejected by Brent Niemann, a representative of the Strata Solar Company. 
 
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 "The panels don't draw additional sunlight," he said. 
 
 But Ms Mann went on to question the higher number of cancer deaths in the area and said it could not be proved that solar panels did not cause cancer, the newspaper said. 
 
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 Link Former treasurer Joe Hockey described wind turbines near Lake George as "utterly offensive". 
 
 "I want information. Enough is enough. I don't see the profit for the town," she said. "People come with hidden agendas. Until we can find if anything is going to damage this community, we shouldn't sign any paper." 
 
 The Woodland area is popular with solar companies because it has an electrical substation that can be used to connect the electricity to the power grid, the newspaper reported. 
 
 But complainants to the council only forecast pain, not gain. Bobby Mann, understood to be Mrs Mann's husband, said other communities had withered after solar farms were installed. 
 
 "You're killing your town," he said. "All the young people are going to move out." 
 
 Another resident, Mary Hobbs, reportedly told councillors the value of her land had decreased because it was surrounded by solar farms. (The council had previously approved three.) 
 
 Councillors ultimately voted 3-1 against the proposed rezoning. 
 
 Australia is, of course, no stranger to the full breadth of arguments deployed against renewable energy. 
 
 Deposed prime minister Tony Abbott once disparaged wind turbines as noisy, ugly and "visually awful", while former treasurer Joe Hockey called them "utterly offensive". 
 
 Speaking after the conclusion of the weekend's landmark climate deal in Paris, US Secretary of State John Kerry said the most important element of the talks was transformation to a clean energy future. 
 
 "The business community of the entire world is receiving a message about countries now moving towards clean, alternative, renewable energy and trying to reduce their carbon footprint," he said. 

 The town of Woodland, North Carolina is in the spotlight this week after rejecting a proposal to rezone a section of land just outside its borders for the use of a solar farm. 
 
 Three solar farms have already been approved in the area, but the local residents are seemingly not impressed. The council defeated the motion for the rezoning of an area on US Highway 258 for an additional solar farm after a public comment period, where members of the town could give their opinions. 
 
 A retired science teacher, Jane Mann, said she was concerned about the rising risk of cancer deaths in the area (despite reports showing that cancer rates in North Carolina have fallen over the 2008 to 2012 period) saying that no one could tell her that solar panels were not causing the cancer. 
 
 She was also concerned that photosynthesis would slow due to the solar panels, stopping the plants from growing in the solar farm fields. "I want to know what's going to happen. I want information. Enough is enough. I don't see the profit for the town," Mann said at the meeting, according to The Roanoke-Chowan News Herald. 
 
 "People come with hidden agendas. Until we can find if anything is going to damage this community, we shouldn't sign any paper," she added. 
 
 Bobby Mann (it's not clear if he's related to Jane), said that he was worried that local communities would dry up. "You're killing your town," he said. "All the young people are going to move out." 
 
 He also argued that solar farms would suck up all the energy from the Sun, and new businesses would not come to Woodland. 
 
 The area just outside Woodland is a popular spot for solar farm developers, because it has an electrical substation, which means the panels can be hooked up to the national grid. While contruction has started on one of the three farms that have already been approved for the area, it's unlikely this forth one will get the go-ahead. 
 
 Unfortunately, this dislike of solar is not new. The New York Times reported in 2011 that when Oradell, New Jersey began putting up solar panels on power poles, many residents were unhappy. "I hate them," Eric Olsen told The New York Times. "It's just an eyesore." 
 
 Other residents were also reported as calling the panels "ugly" or "hideous", and said they were worried about their property value declining because of it. 
 
 However, these panels pushed New Jersey closer to their renewable energy target, which is one of the highest in the US. As of earlier this year, New Jersey also approved a bill that requires the state to get at least 80 percent of all its energy from renewable sources by 2050. 
 
 And not all New Jersey residents have been against these changes, with some seeing the panels as a badge of pride representing their switch to clean energy. 
 
 Hopefully, with increased exposure and better education, we can outline the positives of having solar panels installed in both big cities and country towns. We don't want another fiasco like this Wind Turbine Syndrome travesty.
– The town of Woodland, North Carolina, is taking a drubbing online after its town council not only shot down a proposed solar farm but put a moratorium on future similar projects. It wasn't the mere rejection, however, that's drawing ridicule but some of the comments made by local residents during the comment period as rounded up by the Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald. The big one: A man voiced concern that "solar farms would suck up all the energy from the sun and businesses would not come to Woodland," in the words of the newspaper. "You’re killing your town," he told planning officials. "All the young people are going to move out." A retired science teacher also worried that solar farms would interfere with photosynthesis and result in dead plants around town, and might even cause cancer. "I want to know what's going to happen," she said. "I want information." A representative from the company that floated the proposal assured everyone that solar panels make use only of the sunlight that hits them directly and "don’t draw additional sunlight," but the nays still won the day. (The News-Herald notes that the town council had previously given the green light to three other solar farms.) The story is now generating not-so-flattering headlines all over. A post at Science Alert begins, "Wow" and hopes that "increased exposure and better education" about solar power will help. Ars Technica, meanwhile, looks at satellite images to question one resident's contention that solar farms were becoming a nuisance in the area, while newspapers in the the UK and as far away as Australia are joining in to snigger at the idea of solar panels sucking up all the sun's energy. (Long solar-powered flights are possible, but self-hypnosis helps as a pilot.)