Rural Renewable Energy Development (RRED) Zones offer an incentive to encourage investments that either generate electricity from solar, geothermal, wind, biomass or other such forms of energy, or produce, distribute or store any of a wide variety of biofuels. Throughout Oregon, a city, county or several contiguous counties can set up a RRED Zone that covers all the territory in the jurisdiction(s) outside the urban growth boundary (UGB) of any large city or metropolitan area.
The abatement is the standard (3 to 5 year) exemption from local taxes on new property available in any enterprise zone, except that in a RRED Zone it is only for renewable energy activities (which also would be eligible if located in an enterprise zone). The total amount of property (among one or more projects) that can qualify is subject to a locally-set cap with each RRED Zone designation of $250 million or less in initial market value.
Data Reporting
Typically, annual county assessor reports for standard enterprise zone abatements do include RRED Zone projects, but the handful of such projects are not tabulated here with Enterprise Zone Businesses. Contact the Business Oregon Incentives Coordinator
arthur.fish@oregon.gov or Department of Revenue Research Section at
dor.research@oregon.gov, for any available information.