The largest landfill solar project in North America, a 25.6 megawatt (MW) solar farm in Mount Olive, New Jersey, is online – which means yet another dumpsite has been turned into a revenue-generating, clean energy asset.
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The Combe Fill North Landfill site is a brownfield site that operated from 1966 to 1978 – and it now hosts 56,000 solar panels. It contains domestic and industrial waste and dry sewage sludge.
CEP Renewables and CS Energy developed the project, Terrasmart provided its rack systems, and Lindsay Precast supplied steel skids.
NJR Clean Energy Ventures will own and operate the solar farm under a long-term agreement. NJR Clean Energy Ventures is a subsidiary of utility New Jersey Resources. CEP Renewables owns the land for this project, and the company is leasing it to NJR Clean Energy Ventures.
It is expected to provide more than 4,000 households with clean energy.
The Mount Olive solar project has enabled the township to recoup nearly $2.3 million in past taxes from the former landfill site.
Chris Ichter, executive vice president at CEP Renewables, said:
There are over 10,000 closed landfills in the United States, yet only a small fraction of these parcels have been redeveloped. Transitioning more of these landfill sites into solar projects will create more local tax revenue, jobs, cleaner air, and affordable energy for residents throughout the country.
According to the EPA, there has been an 80% increase in the number of landfill solar projects in the United States over the last five years.
Read more: How ‘unusable’ capped landfill can gain a second life as a solar farm
Photo: CEP Renewables