Bacon County Energy + Agriculture Project: Powering Rural Georgia and Supporting Its Farmers

We chose this county because it is a good location for an energy + ag project and for bolstering the resiliency of the local grid. This made-in-America energy project will produce vital electricity to support Georgia’s electric cooperatives, including the local cooperative Satilla REMC, that power rural Georgia homes.

No. Our project is designed for this specific spot on the grid. Even if utilities wanted more power here, we couldn’t provide it because we’re already using the available capacity.

No. This will be an energy + ag project under our Regenerative Energy agribusiness, and the land will be more fertile after the solar panels are gone than it is now. Silicon Ranch is committed to leaving the land better than when we initially found it. We understand that you value the land here in Bacon County and your heritage—we do too. As the landowner of our projects, we understand our responsibility as good stewards of the land where we locate these projects. That’s why we work so hard to deliver projects that combine energy + agriculture.

Our pre-construction land management practices are designed to stabilize soil to reduce the risk of erosion for the life of the project, while protecting water sources. Pre-construction, whenever prior land use and land acquisition timing permit, we test and amend the soil to ensure it provides ideal conditions for plant growth and pre-seed a regionally appropriate, permanent, perennial seed mix plus annual cover crops to establish a functioning grassland ecosystem and livestock forage.

For the first phase of our project in Bacon County, we worked with Southeast AgriSeeds and The Bee and Butterfly Habitat Fund to determine an optimal seed mix that balances nutritional needs for grazing ruminants with diversity to provide habitat for pollinators. We then worked with Baker Farms to pull and test soil samples to identify necessary nutrients to add to the soil to improve it for plant growth before no-till drill seeding a mix of Tifton 9 Bahiagrass, Chilly Verde Bermudagrass, Autumn Bentgrass, Baladi Berseem Clover, Dixie Crimson Clover, Barduro Red Clover, Red River Crabgrass, Renovation and Durana White Clovers, White Dutch Clover, Heal All, Black Eyed Susan, Choice Chicory, and Tonic Plantain. This mix also included two fast growing annual plants, millet and spring oats, as a nurse crop to help the slower growing perennial plants establish. The nurse crop protects the vulnerable perennial seedlings by reducing weeds, preventing erosion, and providing shade or a windbreak. 

This increases organic matter through the addition of biomass from both the perennials and cover crops and establishes large root systems that reduce compaction and stabilize the soil.  More living roots in the ground improves drainage and water infiltration. These and other soil, water, and biodiversity benefits persist before, during, and after construction.

For the second and third phases of the project, we will test the soil and are in the process of exploring our pre-seeding options to determine whether pre-seeding is feasible. These subsequent phases of the project present challenges outside our control due to their prior use for timber.

Because we own our land, Silicon Ranch is committed to excellent and responsible land stewardship, including our approach to project construction. Like farmers and timber companies, we engage in clearing land, trenching, and constructing roads as essential parts of our operations. We also drive piles and actively work to ensure that erosion does not impact the infrastructure we install over the 40-year useful life of the energy project.

Pre-construction, we test and amend the soil to ensure it provides ideal conditions for plant growth, and pre-seed a regionally appropriate, permanent, perennial seed mix to establish a functioning grassland ecosystem and livestock forage. This yields stabilized soil and additional soil, water, and biodiversity benefits before, during, and after construction. 

During the construction phase, we work to build our sites to the natural contours of the land as much as possible. Silicon Ranch pays a premium to use the NX Horizon XTR terrain-following racking system, which enables us to avoid significant earthwork and preserve much of the original contours of the land. In other words, we pay more to grade less. Moreover, during construction, we use the lightest and smallest equipment possible to reduce pressure on the soil and use controlled traffic patterns to minimize the number of areas that are exposed to vehicles.

Once the project is operational, we nurture the land using regenerative land management practices such as adaptive managed grazing of livestock that decrease erosion and runoff by building healthier soil with more organic matter and promote long-term, deep-rooted perennial vegetation, including pollinator habitat. These practices, which we implement under our Regenerative Energy® agribusiness, improve soil, ecosystem function, water infiltration and water quality, and biodiversity of both plants and wildlife, and help us ensure that the land will be far healthier when the project is decommissioned than it is when we found it.

Unlike virtually every other form of development, our land can be returned to other uses, including continued agricultural production, at the end of the energy facility’s useful life. After decommissioning, the land is an open pasture, now with increased fertility after 40 years of regenerative grazing, ready for the next land use. A warehouse, manufacturing facility, or housing development cannot make this claim. That land is truly lost forever.

Silicon Ranch launched our energy + ag approach to fulfill our commitment to being a good steward of the land in 2019 at our 121-acre Providence Solar Farm in Madison County, Tennessee. We returned the long-time conventional cotton and grain farm to agricultural production with the introduction of 500 sheep that are intentionally managed to heal the land, using the adaptive multi-paddock grazing approach. 

Our sheep grazing program was developed alongside world-renowned regenerative farmer Will Harris, whose multigenerational farm in Early County, GA, White Oak Pastures, borders one of our projects. The knowledge we gained by collaborating with Will, as neighbors, has been essential to not only our Early County project, but all of our energy projects. 

In 2022, we became the first U.S. solar company to purchase its own flock of sheep and hired a team of in-house shepherds to manage those sheep. To help grow our company-owned flock we then became the first solar company to build a lambing barn. The 26,000 square-foot, state-of-the-art facility is located in Houston County, GA. 

Since then, we have continued to expand our use of energy + ag and have become the committed owners of a large and growing flock of thousands of sheep that is restoring company-owned solar farmland. This endeavor provides regenerative land management training and full-time employment to rural residents of all ages, with joint goals of restoring company-owned land and allowing this and future generations to stay in their home communities.

In summary, not only do Silicon Ranch projects not risk “permanent damage to farmland”, but they provide significant ecological, economic, and community benefits:

• Repair beleaguered soils
• Restore organic matter
• Enhance, rather than diminish, agricultural opportunities for local farmers
• Build domestic market share of lamb and mutton and reduce imports from foreign producers
• Prevent more prevalent and irreversible forms of development

Finally, researchers at University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute of Government conducted a comprehensive study and concluded, in addition to other findings, the following: “The likelihood that farmland or forest land would be converted to other uses, such as housing, is an important consideration… Historically, declining returns led many farm and forest landowners to sell their property for residential or commercial development… Returning the land to its original condition [after solar] is a notable opportunity compared to more permanent development, such as housing.”

Like all Silicon Ranch projects, this project requires no investment from the community, local government, or utility.

Silicon Ranch uses First Solar modules manufactured in the U.S., and countless studies have refuted the erroneous claim that “toxic chemical compounds like cadmium and lead can leech into the water and soil”. First Solar’s modules have been used extensively across the U.S. for more than 20 years without incident. In other words, there is no evidence to support this claim that cadmium can leach into the water and soil.

These cadmium telluride (CdTe) panels are not hazardous and do not negatively impact soil or water or endanger human or animal health. First Solar panels do not contain liquids that can leak. The thin layers of CdTe in these panels are stable and solid (high boiling point, low vapor pressure, low solubility) and are encapsulated between thick layers of glass.

First Solar panels are made of tempered glass and pass rigorous hail and other weather testing, as well as the U.S. EPA’s Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure test.

Cadmium telluride is not the same as the element cadmium (Cd), which is toxic, and cadmium telluride does not pose the risks that cadmium poses. In the presence of tellurium, cadmium forms a crystalline lattice that is highly stable.

You may see the word cadmium and become concerned, much as you might with the word chlorine, but when these materials are combined with certain other materials, they become stable compounds with different properties than they have in their solitary forms. You’re likely familiar with the stable compound sodium chloride (NaCI), also known as table salt. It is made of chlorine—an element that in its solitary state is a deadly gas—yet you likely cook with NaCI, heat it up, and eat it on a daily basis. Like sodium chloride, cadmium telluride is a stable compound that is safe even though it is made up in part of the metal, cadmium.

Similarly, the properties of water (H2O) are not similar to those of hydrogen gas (H2) just because the two chemical species both contain hydrogen. Just as it is incorrect to assume water can burn because hydrogen burns, it is incorrect to treat cadmium telluride as if it poses the same risks as cadmium. Thin film CdTe solar panels contain only materials in solid-state form, just like the electronic components in laptops and smartphones. These panels do not contain liquids that can leak.

To learn more about this technology, you can visit the website of our module manufacturer: firstsolar.com/Technology/CadTel

No. We are committed to excellent land stewardship. We avoid wetlands because they are vital for water filtration, flood control, and wildlife habitat. Moreover, federal, state, and local regulations (such as the federal Clean Water Act) prohibit or severely restrict most wetland development and we comply with all regulations. Less than half the land for this facility will be occupied by the solar facility itself. The remaining area will be used for visual buffer, setbacks, and avoided protected wetlands.

The statistical likelihood of a fire occurring at a solar farm is very low—less than 1%*. This is far lower than the fire risk associated with other types of infrastructure, such as residential homes.

Moreover, risk of fire is not a reason to avoid development of essential infrastructure such as utility-scale energy projects. If it were, then we wouldn’t build houses, which are more likely to catch fire than a solar farm. Instead, just like our homes, it means we build, own, and operate projects while taking prudent steps to reduce fire risks.

While the exact number of solar farm fires in the United States is unknown (solar system fires are not tracked as a stand- alone category in this country), international data suggests that solar system fire risk is less than 1% (0.07). Experts believe that international numbers are comparable to those in the U.S., based on limited existing U.S. data.**

Solar equipment is primarily made of non-combustible materials, and equipment that is involved in a thermal event typically burns itself out without a great risk of spreading to other equipment.

Despite the low fire risk associated with solar projects, we take every precaution to reduce even a minimal risk, including the following precautions:

• We provide training to local fire departments on solar farm fire response protocols and upon request, we complete a Fire Risk Assessment with the local emergency services team 
• We develop Fire Risk Assessments in line with National Fire Protection Association guidelines
• We build projects to continually improved design and construction industry specifications
• We complete quality control inspections throughout equipment installation
• We have a proactive maintenance program that includes replacement of old or defective parts
• We conduct regularly scheduled, third-party system testing throughout the life of the project
• We investigate root causes of equipment failures, create remediation plans, and remediate quickly
• We typically mount Inverters on a steel skid, concrete pad, or mound of gravel
• We maintain a 20’ mowed strip outside of the perimeter array fencing to create a fire break and facilitate access
• We maintain a 24” vegetation height below the modules, double the industry standard, giving a greater distance between modules and any vegetation that could catch fire under drought conditions
• We maintain vegetation-free areas around combiner boxes, inverters, and substations
• We use CdTe Modules, thin layers of cadmium telluride semiconductor material that have been confirmed safe by 50+ researchers on every continent and have a 2000 degrees melting point, well above the ground fires temperature of 800-1200 degrees

*The 0.07% chance of a solar system fire is based on a mean average of solar fire data from Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and Japan

**Fire Trace International, Can Solar Farms Cause Fires? August 2022

Additional Sources: Germany: TÜV Rheinland, Assessing Fire Risks in Photovoltaic Systems and Developing Safety Concepts for Risk Minimization and Fraunhofer ISE, Recent Facts about Photovoltaics in Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom: Verisk, Are Solar Panels an Emerging Fire Risk? Japan: There Are – Data Missing – Solar Power Fires Per Year, PV Magazine, August 2019 (cited news release here in Japanese)

We take intentional steps in our facility design, operations, and land management to ensure that the amount of stormwater runoff is less than or equal to the amount of stormwater runoff that exists when we buy the property.

Our regenerative land management practices increase vegetative cover and build soil organic matter and looser soils, leading to more water infiltration, increased water retention, and less stormwater runoff. Once the project is constructed, impervious surfaces (foundation pads, equipment, gravel roadways, etc.) will cover a relatively minor amount of the land housing it. So, while solar panels will be installed on the land, the stormwater will flow off the panels and across the vegetation, allowing for the water to infiltrate and evaporate or be absorbed and replenish the aquifer.

The reduction in stormwater runoff peak flow improves downstream flooding issues. Existing natural resources (e.g., wetlands, ponds, streams, floodplains, etc.) and associated buffer areas are field identified, delineated, reviewed by the appropriate agencies, and marked during construction to be protected. In some circumstances, it may be necessary to temporarily or permanently impact a natural resource to facilitate a crossing location (e.g., access road-stream crossing). In these situations, we secure all necessary permits, and we implement associated mitigative measures.

Like other types of development, utility-scale energy projects are subject to federal, state, and local environmental requirements and we comply or go beyond compliance with all of these.

Solar modules do not cause glare in the houses because modules are designed to absorb (rather than reflect) as much light as possible and are covered with a protective layer of anti-reflective matte glass.

Yes, our projects follow and adhere to all local, state, and federal regulations, including fencing, electric codes, and signage regulations. Additionally, Silicon Ranch projects are monitored 24/7 so that any disturbance to the system can be quickly and safely acted upon.

Once operational, our projects do not generate any noise that can be heard outside the facility fencing. Solar panels themselves are silent, and the inverters, which have a quiet hum not unlike that heard from a residential transformer, are located within the fenced area of our projects. Given compliance with required project setbacks from property boundaries, the inverters are far enough from residential areas to be inaudible.

Our project design will place the inverters and transformers closer to the center of the property. As a result, the hum from any equipment will be inaudible, as we have demonstrated at our other operating locations. The sound level from our project will be between a whisper and the refrigerator in your home, as shown in the graphic below. The inverter’s hum will be imperceptible at the project fenceline (and at a residence as close as 100 feet to the fenceline). Moreover, we do not anticipate that any inverters will be within 100 feet of any residence because the inverters will be placed more towards the center of the solar array.

It depends. Our agricultural and regenerative ranching projects can be farmed by either local farmer partners or in-house agrivoltaics technicians.

At some projects, we partner with regenerative ranchers and local farmers to deliver full-service holistic land management, including adaptive multi-paddock grazing, that keeps the land in agricultural production and restores our project sites to functioning grassland ecosystems.

At other projects, our in-house agrivoltaics technicians manage the land. We recruit our agrivoltaics technicians primarily from rural communities and train them to help manage our lands regeneratively, including to use adaptive multi-paddock sheep grazing as the primary vegetation management tool and to restore grasslands. By employing and training agrivoltaics technicians, we are helping to build traditional jobs for the rural generation to come.

Maintaining the land regeneratively typically generates more jobs during the operations phase of a project than an average, conventionally maintained solar plant generates. We partner with or employ a diverse set of land managers, including ranchers and farmers, mowing partners, and agrivoltaics technicians recruited from rural communities. This project will create five full-time ranching jobs. 

Energy + Ag is a win-win for jobs and local economies. It provides new economic opportunities to farmers and distributes positive impacts to the broader community, through more work for veterinarians, seed and equipment purchases, and other local procurements.

Silicon Ranch never broadcast sprays herbicides or pesticides. We also refrain from spot spraying pesticides at our projects, unless required by state law where a project is located to mitigate noxious weeds determined injurious to agricultural or horticultural crops or, in some instances, to prevent small targeted amounts of vegetation from growing up into equipment that would interfere with solar generation and impede the facility’s ability to deliver power to serve homes and businesses in the long-term. When circumstances require that we use pesticides, Silicon Ranch is committed to minimizing their use, meaning that we only spot spray EPA approved herbicides—which are commonly used on timber farms—when required. We recognize that our responsibility as a good neighbor doesn’t stop at our fence line. Rather than viewing the land housing our solar projects as a liability, we recognize that land and vegetation are valuable natural resources and biological assets. When land and vegetation are managed properly, and in alignment with natural systems, we can revitalize soils, restore grassland ecosystems, increase biodiversity, sequester carbon, improve water quality, and build better solar facilities. Ultimately, through our Regenerative Energy approach, our goal is to leave the land better than we found it.

In summary, Silicon Ranch never uses vegetative growth inhibitors, nor do we blanket spray our sites with broad spectrum, non-selective herbicides. Herbicide use is limited to spot spraying of noxious weeds determined harmful to agricultural or horticultural crops and targeted spraying around inverter and transformer pads and the substation.

Our solar projects are designed with reliability and the highest performance in mind over their 40- year useful lifetimes. This 40-year view means we design the entire plant and select best-in-class equipment to last at least 40 years. Unlike some developers who may focus more on meeting minimum design criteria to reduce short-term costs, Silicon Ranch places more emphasis on reliability and the requirements of long-term ownership.

At the end of 40 years, our projects will either be repowered with new solar equipment or decommissioned. If a project is decommissioned, all system components will be removed, and the ground will be stabilized. All costs associated with the decommissioning process will be the responsibility of Silicon Ranch, not the community or local government. As Silicon Ranch will continue to own the property and will remain a member of the community, we are invested in ensuring that decommissioning will occur safely and responsibly, and that the site is in excellent condition.

Silicon Ranch purchases solar panels for our projects with end-of-life in mind and we seek the most cost-effective and environmentally responsible path for recycling modules at their end of life.

We are committed to leading industry advancements in responsible management of end-of-life solar equipment. Our commitment goes beyond recycling to repurposing, reusing, and fueling domestic manufacturing of solar panels for a circular solar economy.

To process-end-of life solar modules from Silicon Ranch projects, we have partnered with two pioneers in U.S.-based solar industry panel recycling. The first, SOLARCYCLE, offers an advanced platform that recovers approximately 95% of the value of solar panel materials, including glass and aluminum, as well as silicon, silver, copper, and aluminum. The second, First Solar, recovers approximately 90 percent of materials. Recovered module materials are returned to the solar supply chain to help fuel the growing U.S. solar manufacturing industry with a domestic supply of materials essential to the production of new solar panels. For instance, recovered aluminum from the aluminum panel frames will be used to make aluminum frames for new solar panels.

Our industry leading recycling partnerships support our commitments to advance made-in-America solar manufacturing, a circular solar economy that reduces material use and recaptures “waste” as a resource to manufacture new panels, and economic development opportunities in communities across the country.