Solar projects springing up on former brownfields

Feb 7 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Bob Fowler The Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tenn.

Two companies and an economic development group are getting on the solar bandwagon on current and former Department of Energy properties, officials said Tuesday.

Two solar farms are under construction next to a former uranium enrichment facility, a larger one is planned and a grant is being sought to place solar panels atop a building next to Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Officials with the Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee shined some light on the efforts during CROET's quarterly meeting Tuesday.

A German firm, Vis-Solis, is building a solar farm on land it is leasing on CROET-owned property next to the former K-25 site, now called East Tennessee Technology Park.

That project, with solar panels that track the sun's path across the sky, is projected to supply enough electricity to power 20 homes.

Another 200-kilowatt solar farm is under construction by Restoration Services Inc. next to the technology park.

That firm also is in talks with TVA for construction of a much larger solar array on a former powerhouse site on nearby Department of Energy land.

Like the two solar farms now under way, the bigger effort would be a so-called "brownfield to brightfield project," said Gil Hough, manager of RSI's Renewable Energy Division.

"It's very promising and quite possible, but it's still in development," he said of the larger solar farm. It would produce enough electricity to power 100 homes, Hough said.

RSI is negotiating with TVA to also use the utility's solar initiative program for that larger solar farm, Hough said.

In that program, TVA offers incentives if solar panels made in the TVA region and local installers are involved, he said. The utility then buys the electricity that flows into its power grid.

CROET, a nonprofit economic development group finding new uses for former DOE land, is seeking a state grant for solar panels atop a building in the Halcyon Commercialization Center, a high-tech business park next to the national laboratory.

CROET President Lawrence Young said a solar array atop the center could reduce CROET's energy costs there, which he described as "significant."

That building is being used by Roane State Community College to train students taking courses in solar energy and the composites industries, including the carbon fiber technology pilot project nearing completion in Oak Ridge's Horizon Center Business Park.