A 5.5-megawatt (MW) photo voltaic farm simply got here on-line in Rivesville, West Virginia, on a brownfield web site close to a shuttered coal-burning energy station.
Mon Energy and Potomac Edison, subsidiaries of FirstEnergy (NYSE: FE), accomplished their second utility-scale photo voltaic farm in West Virginia 10 months after bringing their first photo voltaic farm on-line, the 18.9-MW Fort Martin Energy Station photo voltaic farm in Maidsville, in January. (Fort Martin continues to be a working coal plant, and FirstEnergy sadly has no intention in any respect of retiring it anytime quickly.)
The brand new Rivesville photo voltaic farm sits on round 27 acres of FirstEnergy-owned coal ash disposal landfill alongside Morgan Ridge Highway. FirstEnergy says the location hasn’t been used for the reason that coal-burning Rivesville Energy Station was shuttered in 2012.
Mon Energy and Potomac Edison employed 63 native union staff for development on the web site, and the photo voltaic panels, racking system metal, and supporting electrical gear are US-made. Practically 14,000 photo voltaic panels at the moment are offering clear electrical energy to just about 1,000 houses.
The 2 utilities started development final month on their third mission, Marlowe, a 5.75-MW photo voltaic farm on a former ash landfill web site in Berkeley County. They’ve a complete of 5 photo voltaic farms within the pipeline.
West Virginia Legislature handed a regulation in 2020 that authorizes electrical utilities to personal and function as much as 200 MW to develop photo voltaic on brownfield websites to assist meet the state’s electrical energy wants. Including renewables to the grid additionally encourages financial improvement in West Virginia, as a rising variety of firms require {that a} portion of the electrical energy they buy be generated by renewable sources.
The businesses say they may search closing approval from the Public Service Fee of West Virginia to construct photo voltaic websites in Davis, Tucker County (11.5 MW), and Weirton, Hancock County (8.4 MW) once they have buyer commitments for 85% of the renewable vitality credit generated by these initiatives.
Mixed, the 5 initiatives will create greater than 87,000 photo voltaic renewable vitality credit (SRECs) out there for buy by prospects who assist renewable vitality in West Virginia. SRECs are certificates that characterize the environmental attributes of solar energy and show photo voltaic vitality was generated on the purchasers’ behalf. For each megawatt hour of photo voltaic renewable electrical energy generated, one SREC is produced.
Dan Rossero, vp of FirstEnergy’s West Virginia Era, mentioned, “Our photo voltaic initiatives create development jobs and assist financial development by serving to West Virginia recruit and retain employers. We’re happy to achieve one other necessary milestone in our photo voltaic program and are excited concerning the curiosity we proceed to obtain from subscribers.”
Mon Energy serves about 395,000 prospects in 34 West Virginia counties, and Potomac Edison serves about 285,000 prospects in seven counties in Maryland and 155,000 prospects within the Japanese Panhandle of West Virginia.
In keeping with the Photo voltaic Vitality Industries Affiliation, West Virginia ranked forty eighth amongst states for its cumulative capability of photo voltaic put in. It’s projected to rise to forty second place over the subsequent 5 years.
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