Solar Power

We were pleased to see this week an announcement from unlikely partners The Nature Conservancy and Dominion Energy with a plan to build a large solar farm on 1,200 acres at the site of the former Red Onion surface mine near Pound, Virginia.

The 50-megawatt solar farm will provide enough power for 12,500 homes and will bring the role of energy production back to the region, this time with a cleaner alternative to burning fossil fuels.

Closed surface mines are perfect sites for utility-scale solar power generation, because the land at these sites is often cleared of trees and leveled and is sometimes left unsuitable for residential development.

A new, clean energy purpose will help turn the negatives left by mountain removal and pit mining into positives.

Earlier this year, The Nature Conservancy announced two other solar projects on its managed lands in Southwest Virginia.

According to the nonprofit group, a big driver making the turn toward clean energy possible is support from elected officials, like the Virginia Clean Energy Act, enacted last year to encourage the state’s utilities to produce electricity from carbon-free sources by 2050.

We’ve seen similar public-private partnerships play out in Tennessee, too, where a 5-megawatt solar farm went live in 2019 and a 9-megawatt farm is under construction, both in Washington County.

It’s encouraging that our region is seizing the opportunity to take part in our nation’s energy future.

We hope the trend continues and gains additional support from public officials and private-sector leaders.

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — Learning comes in all forms, but when you look at some Virginia Beach schools, it’s what you can’t see that is providing the most education.

School is in session at Ocean Lakes Elementary and you can just feel the energy.

“It’s just pretty amazing,” said Ocean Lakes Elementary Principal Dr. Linda Reese.

You can see it too, but only from a different perspective.

“I wish I could bring the kids up here instead of just showing them pictures so they could actually see,” Reese added.

The roof has gone through a renewable transformation.

“There are a lot,” Reese said. “It covers everything. Even the gym roof is covered with panels as well.”

There are 1,030 solar panels, to be exact. It’s new life for an old building and a first for all the 86 Virginia Beach schools.

“We are a zero-energy school and that’s pretty amazing for a building that’s 32 years old,” Reese added.

“The panels on this building will produce about 110% of the energy that this building uses,” said Virginia Beach Schools Sustainability Officer Tim Cole. “That means you don’t have a utility bill at the end of the month.”

The district shells out about $15 million a year for power. Any savings helps.

“It’s a big first step for us and how … we get a better handle on emissions, carbon-based emissions and moving into more renewable energy,” Cole added. “This is a first big step. We have been talking about it for a long time.”

Solar panels will soon be added to other schools meaning the energy will sustainable and so will the education.

“It really is an amazing thing to know that all of this unused space before now is being used for something really good,” Reese said.

Renaissance Academy is another school that is using solar. It has 2,000 panels on its roof and soon should be the second net-zero school in Virginia Beach.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. (WVIR) – St. Mark Lutheran Church just switched their primary power supply to renewable energy. This is now the largest non-profit owned solar system in Charlottesville and among the largest in the state.

“The significant aspect of this system is the fact that it will save the church money so that they will be able to use those resources in the future for good, for more, as well as a healthy environment,” Richard Chrisler with SunDay Solar said.

SunDay Solar is the installer of this project and they say this is the first church they have helped get a little greener. St. Mark Lutheran reached out to them. They realized together this would be a great investment, given the high electric bills in Virginia.

“This is generating a significant amount of power, every day,” Chrisler said. “Over the aggregated will be 80% of what is used here.”

The church not only worked with SunDay Solar to make this possible, but also the City, LEAP, and the University of Virginia Community Credit Union.

“Community literally is our middle name, and we take that very seriously,” Ethan Dunstan with the University of Virginia Community Credit Union said. “It’s great to be a part of projects, great to be able to deploy capital in an ecofriendly way. Solar is just, it’s a win-win for everybody.”

Members of the church say their main goal is reducing their carbon footprint and now encourage others to do so as well.

“Our location here, at the corner of a bit rather busy intersection, is also a very effective way to demonstrate to the community that commitment,” President of the Mission Council St. Mark Lutheran Church Alice McKenna said.

The total cost was around $140,000 but everyone says the time and money are worth it.

“Personally, I am proud, honored and humbled,” McKenna said. “I encourage anybody else who is thinking of doing this, it’s super easy to get.”

Everyone involved in the project says the installation was an easy process and they hope it inspires others to become more eco-friendly too.

Copyright 2021 WVIR. All rights reserved.

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RAJASTHAN:  According to the World Bank, power outages are common across India as over 300 million people in the country still don’t have access to electricity. Rajasthan went through a serious power crisis recently as nine thermal units were shut due to coal shortage. Despite buying electricity at expensive rates, lakhs of people in the state spent a harrowing time in the second fortnight of August.

A modest farmer family from Rajasthan’s Jaipur district offers a ray of hope. Devkaran Yadav and his son Dr Amit Yadav set up a solar plant on their semi-arid 3.5-acre farmland in Bhaloji village near Kotputli town. It is the first farm-based solar power plant in Kotputli under the Prime Minister’s Kisan Urja Suraksha Evam Utthan Mahabhiyan (KUSUM) scheme. For people in the region who have vast, uncultivated lands at their disposal, the solar plant has become a lucrative model. 

The Yadavs have entered into a contract with the Rajasthan Renewable Energy Corporation Ltd for 25 years. It was Dr Amit Yadav (35) who took the initiative for setting up the solar project that has now become a money spinner for the family, earning them over 4 lakh per month. 

He says a few years ago, they had received a huge but incorrect electricity bill. The frustration over getting the bill rectified motivated him to look for alternatives. The search for a more reliable source of electricity for his private hospital took him to solar energy. Soon, he installed solar panels for a 11-KW plant at a cost of Rs 2.5 lakh. Its success not just inspired Dr Yadav and his family but also made them do extensive research on the benefits of solar energy.

Then he came to know about the KUSUM scheme. “We had farmlands but due to lack of groundwater, they had turned into barren fields. So, in 2019, we moved an application to set up a 1 MW project under the scheme,” recalls Dr Yadav. 

In September 2020, they signed a contract with the Central government to produce solar energy under the scheme. Since many of his relatives had shares in the parcel of land that the family owns, they had to be convinced. Ultimately, it was Dr Yadav’s assurance that he would bear all the risks that pulled down all barriers. 

For setting up the project, however, a hefty sum of Rs 3.5 crore was needed. Devkaran Yadav invested Rs 70 lakh from his retirement benefits, besides mortgaging some of his properties to a bank which helped raise Rs 1.7 crore. Dr Yadav said, “The scheme was new and involved risks. I also carried the huge psychological pressure that all my father’s retirement money would be put to risk if we flopped.”

The family also faced a host of other difficulties. For instance, they had no idea about the layout diagram about which even local officials seemed clueless. Also, permissions had to be taken to supply the electricity to the power grid. A lot of officials were indifferent to their project.

Even after the installation was complete, the commissioning of the plant went into rough weather as the government had not appointed a nodal monitoring officer under the scheme. Even a notice by Dr Yadav bore no fruit and the commissioning was delayed by almost three months. He lodged a complaint with the PMO. “This complaint was duly attended and the work, thereafter, went off at a breakneck speed,” Dr Yadav says.

Farmland turns money-spinner for Yadav family
This 1 MW project has the capacity to produce 17 lakh units of electricity per year. The project has been developed at a cost of Rs 3.70 crore and is expected to generate an annual income of about Rs 50 lakh for the Yadavs from the purchase of electricity by discoms at Rs 3.40 per unit.