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Solar News

Work begins on 150-acre Georgia Power solar farm

A groundbreaking ceremony Thursday kicked off construction of a 150-acre solar farm on the Marine Corps Logistics Base-Albany that will generate up to 44 megawatts of power. Once completed, the $75 million facility is expected to be one of the state’s largest solar installations. Some 138,000 southwest-facing fixed panels planned for the site could power up to 5,000 homes.

Source: Work begins on 150-acre Georgia Power solar farm – Atlanta Business Chronicle

Old power gives way to new power in south Georgia

Albany in southwest Georgia is in a state of transition these days — from old power to new power. Thursday, Georgia Power broke ground on a solar power farm near Albany that will deliver 31 megawatts of power — enough to supply roughly 5,000 homes .Meanwhile, the Atlanta utility shut down part of a 52-year-old coal- and oil-fired plant near Albany last year, and plans to shut down the rest of it if state regulators approve its decommissioning.

Source: Old power gives way to new power in south Georgia | www.ajc.com

Glimmers of a brighter, more solar-powered Georgia

12/7/15—Georgia only pulls a fraction of a percent of its electric energy from solar power. Despite a boom in the industry that installs panels on rooftops of offices and homes — and even in fields in rural Georgia — and a slow trickle of legislation that has made it easier to tap the renewable resource, solar power is not where it could — or should — be in the state. Strong utility interests (some of whom are slowly coming around) and complex qualms over dollars and cents in the past have hindered real progress. But the push for clean energy has finally started to gain traction.

Source: Glimmers of a brighter, more solar-powered Georgia | Atlanta News & Opinion Blog | Fresh Loaf | Creative Loafing Atlanta

Solar installers battling threat to small-scale projects

10/23/15—Georgia solar installers won a major victory this year when the General Assembly unanimously passed legislation letting them offer third-party financing to make solar panels more affordable.

But with the new law now more than three months old, installers and other solar energy advocates say Georgia Power Co. is under-compensating property owners for the electricity their panels are producing, discouraging the small-scale solar projects at the heart of the installers’ businesses.

“Georgia Power clearly has a preference for large-scale utility solar,” said Jason Rooks, director of government affairs for the Georgia Solar Energy Industries Association. “We need to put some focus on distributed generation because there are benefits to those electrons.”

Source: Solar installers battling threat to small-scale projects – Atlanta Business Chronicle