A onetime Lancaster landfill has new life as the site of a solar panel installation.
The site is located on 118 acres of the former Lancaster Sanitary Landfill, off Gunnville and Shisler roads behind the Lancaster Motorplex racetrack. The landfill closed in 1985 after more than 20 years in operation.
The solar panels will generate more than 12 megawatts of electricity, enough to power around 1,500 homes, said Steve Owen, senior vice president of business and project development with Catalyze, the company that owns and operates the project.
Officials in the Town of Marilla are concerned that solar arrays are being erected on valuable farmland.
It started generating power in October.
“Utilizing brownfields for solar development has been a focus, not only at Catalyze, but generally speaking, looking to do something with these sites that are contaminated or filled with trash,” Owen said.
Brownfields are lands that were developed for industrial purposes, polluted and then abandoned.
The site is made up of two separate solar arrays, which both generate around 6 megawatts of power.
Though much smaller than some of the largest solar installations in Western New York that produce hundreds of megawatts of power, the Lancaster project is one of many sites that make…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply