<
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/illinois-community-solar-turns-superfund-site-into-energy-savings/>
"As someone who spent several years as a workers’ rights organizer, Fredy
Amador is intimately familiar with the financial struggles people face in the
current economy. Northern Illinois’ skyrocketing energy bills make the
situation even tougher.
Now, Amador has become an evangelist for something that can provide a modest
measure of relief: A community solar project, built on a Superfund site too
polluted for much else in the city of Waukegan where he lives, about 40 miles
north of Chicago.
Residents who subscribe to get energy from the solar farm are guaranteed to see
savings on their energy bills, under a state program incentivizing solar in
low-income areas.
The 9.1-megawatt Yeoman Solar Project, which went online last month, can
provide energy for about 1,000 households, as well as the Waukegan school
district, which owns the land.
The school district bought the site in the 1950s hoping to build a new high
school. But the land proved too swampy, and from 1958 to 1969 it was used as a
dump for industrial and municipal waste. The highly contaminated Yeoman Creek
Landfill was finally cleaned up 20 years ago, and now the district receives
lease payments from CleanCapital, the national solar-investment company that
owns and operates the solar farm.
Such brownfields are attractive locations for solar installations because of
“existing electrical infrastructure, lower-cost land, and community
acceptance,” noted Paul Curran, CleanCapital’s chief development officer.
Incentives from the state initiative Illinois Solar for All helped make the
project financially viable, even given extra costs incurred from building on a
Superfund site.
It’s an example of how state policy can drive clean energy development and cost
savings, even as federal tax credits for solar are being cut. The project also
shows how solar can turn a community liability into an asset.
“The Yeoman Solar Project encapsulates so much of solar’s promise,” said Andrew
Linhares, senior manager for the central U.S. at the Solar Energy Industries
Association, a trade group. “The project instills new life into the Yeoman
Creek Landfill Superfund site like only solar can.”"
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
