Pleased to discover my utility is 'into' renewables. [View all]

'SMECO Solar, a subsidiary of Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative, operates a solar farm in Hughesville to convert sunlight into energy. By harnessing the power of the sun, the solar farm, which sits on 33 acres of SMECO-owned land, uses 23,716 photovoltaic panels to generate 5.5 megawatts of electricity.

SMECO uses some of the solar energy to supply the needs of the Engineering and Operations Center, but the majority of the power is delivered to the grid. The state of Maryland requires all electric utilities to use a certain amount of renewable energy, and the SMECO solar farm helps us to fulfill that requirement.

The cost to construct the solar project has no impact on the distribution portion of customer bills.

We used land that we already owned when we built the solar farm, so we didn’t need to purchase property.
We received a grant of $6 million, so SMECO didn’t have to bear the full cost of construction.'>>>

https://www.smeco.coop/about/smeco-solar

I passed the facility today.