Virginia’s Push for Solar Panels Offers Few Rays of Hope

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Free Beacon

Many Civil War battles were fought on the farms surrounding Culpeper, Va., about an hour outside Washington, D.C., and in the shadow of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Now, a new conflict is underway, as members of the local community push back against energy providers attempting to cover Culpeper—and other parts of rural Virginia—with solar facilities, sometimes thousands of acres in size.

The push for solar in Virginia is part of a nationwide effort to ramp up several fashionable renewable energy sources in the United States. To attract energy providers, federal, state, and local governments offer generous tax credits and subsidies for solar and wind facilities.

Virginia's General Assembly voted in 2016 to subsidize solar and wind energy with an 80 percent sales and use tax exemption for machinery, tools, and equipment for public service corporations, following a number of legislative pushes for clean energy in the state. It was a successful strategy: Since the decision, solar providers have gained approval to set up shop in Spotsylvania, Chesterfield, Accomack, and other communities. The proposed solar facility in Culpeper, operated by the California-based Cricket Solar, will cover 800 acres of land intended for agricultural use and is set to produce 80 megawatts of power for the county.