Solar farm planned for 1,500 acres in Hanover set for Planning Commission vote this week – RichmondBizSense
Strata Clean Energy’s zoning request tied to a proposed solar facility on 1,500 acres outside Beaverdam in Hanover is expected to be considered by the Planning Commission Thursday. (Google Maps)
A large solar energy facility planned on Hanover’s northwestern edge is up for a review by the county Planning Commission.
Strata Clean Energy is seeking zoning approval to build a solar farm on a 1,500-acre site east of Ben Gayle Road and just north of its intersection with Beaverdam Road. The solar panels would occupy about 340 acres of the overall project site, according to a staff report.
Hanover planning commissioners are scheduled to hold a public hearing and vote Thursday on whether to recommend the proposal’s approval to the Board of Supervisors, which is expected to weigh final approval at a future date.
Strata intends to start construction of the North Anna River Solar project by early 2027 and plans for the facility to be operational by 2028, pending county approvals. The proposed 72-megawatt facility would be able to power 18,000 homes for 35 years, said Morgan Quicke, Strata’s manager of local government affairs.
The project is currently anticipated to cost between $130 million and $160 million.
Strata filed a conditional use permit request earlier this year needed to allow the project on land that’s zoned agricultural (A-1). Quicke said the company has held four community meetings ahead of the Planning Commission’s consideration. A fifth community meeting was planned to take place last night.
Solar arrays would be established on about 340 acres of the overall project site. (County documents)
Strata anticipates it will lease the majority of the 1,500-acre project site on which it will build the solar facility, though the company’s plans also involve the acquisition of about 100 acres of the site. The site’s acreage consists of multiple parcels split between two private owners, with only one landholder willing to sell, said Laura Wilson, Strata senior business development manager.
Whether Strata would own the Hanover facility on a long-term basis or sell it to Dominion Energy, which has been done before with other Strata solar projects in Virginia, is still being determined. If Strata retained the solar farm, the company would sell the electrical energy generated to Dominion.
“Typically in Virginia, the model is to sell to Dominion,” Wilson said. “I will say there have been conversations with Dominion, they are aware of this project. We have floated it to them as something that they might be interested in buying.”
Quicke said Strata is taking pains to minimize the environmental impacts of the project, which sits on the North Anna River that separates Hanover and Caroline counties. Strata says more than half of the project site would remain undeveloped, and would feature wildlife corridors. The project is planned to have setbacks of at least 500 feet from residences and have environmental buffers within the site.
The project site was selected for its size and the presence of an existing electrical transmission line that cuts through the property.
Noting that solar energy proposals frequently meet opposition from residents, Quicke said the company’s approach is to highlight to local officials the economic benefits of facilities and relatively lower effect on county services compared to other economic development projects.
“We’re not seen in the same ways that Amazons and Microsofts are in what they’re bringing, but it is a big focus point for us that we’re economic development,” Quicke said. “We have a facility that will be a fairly passive use of land for a long period of time, providing (tax) revenue to a locality that doesn’t need your schools and your fire departments.”
The Hanover project wouldn’t be the first in the Richmond region for Strata, a Durham, North Carolina-based firm founded in 2008. The company built Dominion’s Dry Bridge Battery Energy Storage System facility in Chesterfield, which became operational in late 2022. Strata also constructed the Scott Solar facility in Powhatan and Correctional Solar facility in New Kent, which are both owned by Dominion.
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