Solar Project

Dissatisfied with last year's solar-farm agreement for state prison land, state Sen. Christopher B. Shank is pressing to change the lease process. In July 2011, the Maryland Board of Public Works voted to lease 250 acres at the prison complex south of Hagerstown to Maryland Solar LLC for about $32,000 a year to start. The rent would rise 3 percent in year four of the 20-year lease, then every other year after that. Shank maintains that the state could have done much better.

Under a broiling sun, Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley joined a groundbreaking ceremony Saturday for what will be the largest solar power array in the state - and one of the biggest on the East Coast - when it is completed later this year. The 100-degree temperature was “a reminder from Mother Nature that the sun is our most abundant resource,” O'Malley told an audience of about 100 guests sitting inside an air-conditioned tent before the ceremony. Maryland has set a goal to produce 20 percent of its energy from renewable sources - solar, wind and geothermal - by 2022, O'Malley said.

I am not proud to say that I live for these moments. The moments when the tense, dysfunctional relationship between state Del. John Donoghue and Sen. Chris Shank blow sky high, hot and frothy like a Yellowstone geyser. These are supposed to be grown-up lawmakers, but they behave more like two little brothers in the back seat of a car during a family trip. "Mom, he hit me. He started it. He did it again, did you see him? Tattletale. Snotnose. Stop it, or I'm telling.

The solar farm being built at the state prison system south of Hagerstown will have 175,000 panels on about 160 acres, an official with the solar company said Wednesday. The $70 million project will generate about 20 megawatts of electricity at peak, enough to power about 2,250 average homes. And it will move Maryland one step toward its mandate of having 20 percent of its electricity generated by renewable energy sources by 2022. Gov. Martin O'Malley's StateStat website says the state is at 27 percent of its 2022 goal.

With little discussion, a proposed solar farm in Washington County advanced a step on Thursday, as a state utility official accepted uncontested evidence in the case. The next step will be a public hearing at Hagerstown Community College on Wednesday. If there are no complications, Hearing Examiner Dennis Sober can soon recommend that Maryland Solar LLC be awarded a certificate of public need and necessity for its project. Maryland Solar plans to install at least 100,000 photovoltaic cells on land at the state prison complex south of Hagerstown.

Solar panels are coming to Hagerstown Community College. Students at HCC toured the solar farm on Roxbury Road on Monday along with staff and faculty as part of the school's collaboration with First Solar that was announced in a press release at the beginning of November. “We're trying to show the students the general building blocks of a utility-scale solar power plant,” said Peter Seidel, First Solar's regional manager of projects. “This fits right in our corporate culture, trying to educate the students and the public about alternative energy.” The tour went through the 20-megawatt Maryland Solar facility, a First Solar project that is in progress, as First Solar explained what was happening.

Funkstown officials agreed to explore the possibility of getting solar panels built near the town's wastewater treatment plant, a project that could reduce the town's electrical costs for the plant. At Mayor Paul N. Crampton Jr.'s request, Phil Kelly with Millennium 3 Energy made a presentation during Monday night's Town Council meeting about a possible solar panel project. Kelly said the town would not pay for installation of the solar panels, but would reap the lower cost of electricity than what the town is paying Potomac Edison.

Ten students from Hagerstown Community College recently found employment in the alternative-energy field. All 10 students are graduates or are enrolled in HCC's alternative-energy technology program, and received training in solar, wind or geothermal systems. Recently employed students include Jeff Grimes of Smithsburg and Stuart Smith of Boonsboro, who were hired by Sustainable Energy Systems; Chris Dellinger and Ryan Ballard, both of Hagerstown, who were hired by Mountain View Solar; David Sanders of Waynesboro, Pa., who was hired by Millennium 3 Energy; Larry Cool of Hagerstown, who was hired by Manitowoc; Terry Mose of Hagerstown and Dale Findley of Clear Spring, who were hired by Cinetic Landis; Carol Seipler of Hagerstown, who was hired by Nexus Energy Homes; and David Smith of Hagerstown, who was hired by Manpower to work on the Washington County solar farm project.

I speak out of love, but at first blush, solar panels on Ernst Country Market would seem like WiFi on a Victrola. What will we see next, Sam Drucker on Facebook? But other local businesses might notice this fact: Ernst Market has been around since 1945; businesses don't last for 65 years by making dumb moves. Greg Ernst said he agonized over leaping into such a large project involving a fledgling technology. I'm sure a lot of visionaries have had the same feelings about a lot of endeavors over the years.

On Saturday, July 7, I saw something I thought I would never see: A liberal Democratic governor from a “blue state,” read the words of Abraham Lincoln, arguably a founder of the current Republican Party, to a crowd largely comprised of conservative “red staters.” And upon completion of his reading, Gov. Martin O'Malley received a standing ovation. Wonders never cease to amaze. I've got to hand it to O'Malley, his reading at the Maryland Symphony Orchestra's presentation of Aaron Copland's Lincoln Portrait was excellent; so was his speech earlier in the day to a gathering of folks celebrating the groundbreaking of First Solar's energy project at the prisons.