Residents wanting solar panels face stumbling blocks

Editor’s Note: This story has been corrected. We previously wrote that Hancock’s new solar and wind ordinance entirely prohibits industrial solar, but that isn’t the case. It restricts industrial solar to I-1 industrial districts and requires permits. We apologize for the confusion.

Renewable energy advocates say that homeowners can save money on electricity by installing solar panels, but there are stumbling blocks to using solar panels in the Keweenaw area. They include state distributed-generation regulations, net metering caps set by electric utilities and local zoning ordinances regulating installation of solar panels.

Net metering is an electricity billing tool that uses the electric grid to “store” excess energy produced by an individual’s solar panel system. Under net metering, the value of the energy produced by solar panels that a homeowner doesn’t use is credited back to their electric bill.

Net metering was designed to encourage the adoption of solar energy.  The system was pioneered in the United States as a way to help use solar and wind to provide electricity. It enables customers who generate their own power to receive credit for the electricity they contribute to the grid.  

A report by the Michigan State University Extension Service calls net metering “the gold standard” for solar billing in the U.S. According to the report, it was one of the main reasons the number of solar installations in Michigan quintupled between 2011 and 2018.

In 2018, Michigan’s Public Service Commission replaced net metering with a distributed generation program. Using distributed generation, electric utilities can credit less to residents who send their excess solar energy to the grid.

The Upper Peninsula Power Company (UPPCO), Detroit Energy (DTE), Consumers Energy and some other electric utilities and co-ops in Michigan are using the distributed generation program.

Solar Caps

State law does not prevent electric companies from setting caps on the amount of solar energy generation eligible for credit,

UPPCO, which serves the Keweenaw peninsula, recently raised its cap to 3.5%. That means that the most a customer with solar panels can contribute to the grid for credit is 3.5% of peak demand or load and capacity. 

Peak demand is the highest amount of electricity demand within a particular period of time. Load is the total electrical power being removed by the users of the grid. Capacity is the maximum output an electricity generator can physically produce, measured in megawatts.

There’s a thornier problem facing homeowners who want to install solar panels in our area. They say they have been told that the cap has been met in the UP as a region, so no more solar panel installations are eligible for the credit.

UPPCO spokesperson Brett French says that is not true.

“We have not reached the cap, and we are accepting applications,” he said in a phone interview.

Dr. Elizabeth Benyi

Dr. Elizabeth Benyi, who lives near Calumet, talked to her neighbors and got a few of them interested in installing solar panels.

“But again, when it came to permitting, they were denied because of the cap on solar,” she says.

An osteopathic physician and surgeon, Benyi lived in L’Anse for 10 years before she moved to Calumet. She wanted to get solar panels installed on her house in L’Anse. She says Blue Earth Solar tried to get permits for the installation but were refused. They were told that the solar cap had been met in the UP, so no more solar projects that tied into the power grid were allowed.  

Pending Legislation

Benyi has been working for two years to help get legislation passed to get rid of the solar cap. First introduced in 2021 by Greg Markkanen, state representative for the legislative district that includes the Keweenaw, it would have eliminated the solar cap.

“But to no avail,” Benyi said.

New bills recently introduced by both Representative Markkanen and State Senator Ed McBroom, who also represents the Keweenaw, would remove the cap on solar energy credits.

Michigan State Rep. Greg Markkanen at a town hall event in Ontonagon. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

“I am very passionate about this issue,” said Markkanen in a phone interview. “We need to lift the cap and give people a choice. Many states near Michigan don’t have a cap.”

McBroom agrees.

“The system that we have in this state is rigged against controlling costs for individual consumers,” he said in a phone interview. “That’s unfair. The system isn’t working to the benefit of the people. Our high electric bills are stifling our economy.”

“The cap does discourage people from installing solar,” says Allan Baker, who has installed solar panels on the sides of the apartment building he owns in Houghton.

Senator McBroom has introduced two bills in the Michigan Senate. One would remove the solar cap. The other would bring back net metering and make it easier to establish community solar systems.

“Small-scale, local solar projects will be particularly useful to residents, providing an opportunity to independently produce energy for themselves and their neighbors, and providing savings on energy bills for those who subscribe,” the senator said.

According to the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, Michigan currently does not have enabling legislation for community solar, so community solar programs in Michigan must be developed and managed through a local electric utility.

Escanaba and L’Anse have both established community solar systems. Those municipalities are served by their own, local electric utilities, not by UPPCO, Senator McBroom pointed out. L'Anse is served by L'Anse, Michigan Electric Utility, a municipally-owned organization.  The City of Escanaba owns its own electric utility.

The senator thinks the legislation removing the cap and enabling community solar will pass. He’s less confident about bringing back net metering.

“The big utilities like UPPCO have powerful lobbies,” he explained.

Zoning Issues

As if caps on solar weren’t enough of a roadblock, there are zoning ordinances that severely regulate installation of solar panels.

The Michigan Zoning Enabling Act requires all zoning to be based on a master plan. The master plan therefore establishes the community’s formal policy position on solar energy development. Roof-mounted solar panels are allowed in most zoning jurisdictions in Michigan, according to an MSU Extension Service report.

The City of Hancock just passed a zoning ordinance regulating the development and use of solar and wind energy. The ordinance permits private, residential solar but limits “industrial” solar – systems designed for sale of power generated to off-site consumers – to the I-1 industrial district. This includes solar farms or gardens, which are community systems.

Calumet and Stanton Township have no zoning ordinances prohibiting solar panels, although Stanton Township Supervisor Marty Rajala said, “My personal opinion, not the township’s, is that anyone dumb enough to place a solar panel in our area, where the sun shines 15% of the year, should be allowed to throw their own money away and not be subsidized by the government.”

Houghton permits solar panels, subject to the city’s zoning ordinance, according to City Manager Eric Waara.

Adams, Franklin, Portage and Chassell Townships did not respond to questions about zoning ordinances regulating solar panels.

All About Money

What’s causing the ongoing conflict that has the solar industry and environmentalists on one side and utility companies and local zoning boards on the other?

It seems to be all about money.

“The cap has always been an artificial construct given to the utilities to help them make more money,” says Senator McBroom.

“UPPCO doesn’t have the best interests of the people at heart,” Representative Markkanen remarked. “It is a private, for-profit company with its eye on the bottom line and making money for its shareholders.”

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More News

Local Graveyards: A Quiet Repository of Personal Histories

A grave marker is almost entirely hidden at the base of a tree inside the Hecla Cemetery, Oct. 19. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

Those who lie here…

Last weekend, the Keweenaw Green Burial Alliance hosted a tour of graveyards in the Calumet area, including the Schoolcraft Cemetery, the Hecla Cemetery, and the Congregational Peniel Jewish Cemetery.

None of the three have been active for the last century, and many of the gravestones have tilted, fallen, or been knocked down. Some are beginning to be difficult to read after a century of weathering. Many are overgrown with myrtle and other brush and remain hidden from easy sight.

The beautiful, haunting, October aesthetic is undeniable. While it’s easy for many of us to drive by these stones and remark on the beauty without a second thought, there are those in the community who have worked hard to preserve the memory of the people interred beneath.

From the Schoolcraft Cemetery during the Oct. 16 group tour. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

The headstones often record violent causes of death, revealing an industrial and frontier history where the ages of the deceased were typically well below today's life expectancy.

Forgotten graveyards recovered

The Schoolcraft Cemetery

This cemetery, also known as the Centennial Cemetery, was founded in 1865 on about 5.3 acres by the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company. More than 400 gravesites are recorded there on FindAGrave.com, and more than half of them have been photographed and researched by Lynette Webber, a 2021 graduate of Michigan Tech and a member of the Gamma Theta Upsilon geographical honor society. She and fellow GTU member Brooke Batterson, a master’s degree student in the industrial heritage and archaeology program at MTU, work to recover, record, and maintain the graveyard with other volunteers as one of their GTU chapter projects.

This Schoolcraft Cemetery marker stone looks blank, but there’s a high chance the engraving is simply on the other side. A gated cemetery plot blends into the trees of the background. Lynette Weber said many plots have yet to be uncovered here. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

Batterson said that there are 440 - 500 burial spaces, but there could be more than 700 individuals interred there because of different practices like women sometimes being buried with an infant. The team, which includes graduate student James Juip, Assistant Professor Mark Rhodes, and Social Sciences Instructor Kathryn Hannum— all from MTU—has been working to map the gravesites with GPS technology and has completed about 234 of them. They’ve also been helping clear brush and walking trails with support from Calumet Township.

In the 1890s, the cemetery was considered full and burials were discouraged there in favor of Lake View Cemetery, which opened in 1894. However, occasional burials did continue to happen.

“It’s hard to know before 1897 who was buried there,” Weber said, “because it wasn’t included on death records—the cemetery or where they were left to rest.”

Some of the burials there were also disinterred, either to be reburied with family elsewhere or to be moved to the veteran’s section in Lake View Cemetery when it opened.

Schoolcraft Cemetery. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

Calumet Township now owns the Schoolcraft Cemetery property, but for many years, Weber said the cemetery remained in the hands of the mining company.

“And they weren’t really in the cemetery business,” she said.

The mining company wasn’t interested in spending time or money in the graveyard. They also weren’t interested in keeping thorough, accurate records about the site.

“Even while Calumet and Hecla was still active, they weren’t doing a whole lot,” Weber said.

But Weber said that’s part of what makes the project exciting for GTU, the potential for rediscovery.

Schoolcraft Cemetery. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

The Hecla Cemetery

Also known as the Laurium or Sacred Heart Cemetery, this burial site was founded circa 1860 by the Calumet and Hecla Mining Company, and contains nearly 300 graves, according to research by Jeremiah Mason, Keweenaw National Historical Park Archivist. It was a Catholic cemetery, but no sexton’s records have been found for it. Most Catholic burials were placed in Lake View Cemetery starting around 1905.

From the Hecla Cemetery. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

Between 1905 and 1958, local citizens repeatedly organized cleanups to try and keep the cemetery maintained. Ruth Gleckler, one of the current volunteer custodians, has found articles about cleanups and repair by the Catholic Societies, Father Humbert, and Sacred Heart Church itself.

Despite community efforts, it eventually fell into disrepair and suffered repeated vandalism and even illegal dumping. Headstones continue to be used as party locations by teens even after modern cleanup work, with ashes from a recent fire and other refuse still found in front of them.

In 2007, the land was purchased by the Houghton-Keweenaw County Genealogical Society and donated to Calumet Township. Several groups of volunteers have been working to restore it since then, with contributions from the National Park Service, Knights of Columbus, and many volunteers. The HKCGS has photos of many of the gravestones on their website, with chalk rubbings to make them more readable.

Hecla Cemetery. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

The Congregation Peniel Jewish Cemetery

Also known as the Jewish Lake View Cemetery, or simply the Calumet Jewish Cemetery.

According to Gleckler, there is an article from the Copper Country Evening News dated Sept. 14, 1900, that says a man named Max Gittler bought 3 acres next to the town of Lake View to establish a Jewish burial ground. According to the article, the Jewish families in the area needed a closer cemetery for burials, as the closest Jewish burial ground was in Marinette. Jewish tradition requires burial as soon as possible, within 24 hours of death traditionally. However, the rocky ground made burials difficult, and the cemetery was only used for about ten years.

FindAGrave.com shows only nine burials in the cemetery, but Gleckler said there are likely more.

Memories of the interred

A gated plot within the Schoolcraft Cemetery. Photo by Joshua Vissers.

Weber, who led the tour through the Schoolcraft cemetery, is uploading much of the volunteer’s efforts onto FindaGrave.com, which makes a useful public repository for knowledge and photographs, although she said the crowd-sourced information isn’t always trustworthy. It serves as a useful tool for sharing their discoveries.

“I have actually gotten a few different responses from descendants who were very excited,” Weber said. “Some of them were able to go to the cemetery after we uncovered the grave marker for their family member and tidy it up a lot more.”

She said some markers they revealed had been searched for by family for as many as 50 years. There are many others that are still missing.

When they uncover a new marker, they can look the name up in birth, marriage, death, and census records. They can also check newspaper archives if they suspect the person died in an accident or crime that would have been covered.

Caroline Shwykert 1868-1875

Weber found Caroline Shwykert’s story to be among the most tragic they uncovered. After going out to retrieve the family cow, 7-year-old Caroline never returned. Her body was later found in Slaughterhouse Creek.

This article picks up the story from there.

Added to FindaGrave.com by Lynette Weber

Caroline’s father, Louis Schweigert, was a German immigrant who served in the Civil War. He was killed by gas in the mine and initially buried next to Caroline but was later moved to Lake View Cemetery for the newly-opened veteran’s section.

Caroline remains buried in the Schoolcraft Cemetery, next to a footstone labeled “L.S.” marking a now-empty grave.

Added to FindaGrave.com by Lynette Weber

“I think that’s a very compelling story in a lot of different ways,” Weber said. “There’s a lot of ‘what-ifs’ in a cemetery.”

Joseph Pope 1869-1893

Joseph Pope was one of ten men who died in a horrific mineshaft accident. When coming up a near-vertical shaft for their lunch, the hoist cage was pulled against the roof of the shaft house, crushing some of the occupants. The coupling pin then broke and the cage fell more than 3,000 feet to the bottom of the shaft.

The Calumet and Hecla Mining Company accepted no liability for what they called a mechanical failure but did pay out $1,000 to each of the victims’ families.

Added to FindaGrave.com by Lynette Weber

“It’s surreal to me because we’re around the same age,” Batterson said.

Green burial alternatives

The tour on Oct. 16 was organized and hosted by the Keweenaw Green Burial Alliance, proponents of a “dust to dust” approach to burial in which the body is laid to rest in a way that encourages natural decomposition.

In a green or natural burial, the body is buried in a more wild setting, like an unmowed meadow or woodland, without using toxic embalming fluids, cement vaults, or plastic grave liners. The body is buried in a biodegradable container and may or may not have any kind of marker, depending on the rules of the cemetery. Locations of burials are carefully recorded and provided to families on request.

Green burials are favored among those concerned about the environmental impacts of conventional burial or cremation, and those who want their body’s nutrients to return to nature.

A tilted grave marker in the Schoolcraft Cemetery. Lynette Weber said many stones have been hit by falling trees, but some of the damage is also vandalism. Photo by Joshua Vissers.