Main Street Power Company Inc., in partnership with MS Solar Solutions Corp., an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary of Morgan Stanley, and project developers Syncarpha Solar LLC and Renewable Energy Massachusetts LLC, will celebrate the end of construction on a 6-MW solar energy facility on a former gravel pit at Bolton Orchards in Bolton, Mass. A ribbon-cutting ceremony hosted by project partners will be held on Thursday November 14, 2013.
In addition to significant environmental benefits, the 20,774-panel solar facility and accompanying long-term ground lease provide operating revenue to Bolton Orchards, which enables continued operation of its historic fruit harvesting operation well into the future. The 250-acre working farm and fruit orchard began operations in the 1930s, and its commercial farm stand remains a popular destination for both locals and tourists. Bolton Orchards preferred to host a clean energy facility rather than sell the 50-acre solar site to residential developers. Joel O’Toole, Managing Partner of Bolton Orchards, said, “We believed that the solar farm concept would be a win-win for everyone involved and a great re-use of our land. We are extremely proud to see this facility generating clean, renewable energy for the citizens of Bolton and surrounding towns, while helping sustain the farm.”
The Town of Bolton will benefit from the solar facility’s annual property taxes, while the nearby Town of Chelmsford, Mass., with higher electricity demand and capacity than Bolton, will purchase most of the Bolton facility’s 7.4 million kilowatt hours of annually generated electricity under the Massachusetts DPU net metering incentive program. Chelmsford’s Town Manager Paul Cohen worked with his town officials to negotiate a 25-year Net Metering Power Sales Agreement (NMPSA) with Main Street Power, who owns and operates the facility. The Town of Chelmsford receives 25 years of discounted electricity rates for the energy produced by the solar facility under the NMPSA. From its Boston sales and engineering office, Gehrlicher Solar America Corp. designed, engineered and constructed the project using majority local labor. The Bolton solar facility’s annual energy output is roughly equal to the electricity needs of 1,000 typical U.S. residences.
“Our mission is to deliver clean renewable energy in partnership with local communities and developers,” said Amory Host, CEO of Main Street Power. With the earlier completion of projects in Stow and Scituate, he added, “We are pleased to be hereby completing our third such project in Massachusetts per the Commonwealth’s 2008 Green Communities Act.”
“We at REM believe that local distributed solar energy facilities, like this one at Bolton Orchards, help to move our electricity supply in a cleaner direction, since it still remains the case that 42% of America’s electricity is sourced by coal plants,” said Brian Kopperl, Managing Partner of REM. He added, “Without the net metering and Solar Renewable Energy Credit incentives mandated by the Green Communities Act, we wouldn’t be having this ribbon-cutting event in Bolton.”
— Solar Builder magazine
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