National Grid has eye on solar
Location of new substations have attracted developers looking to cite projects nearby
When National Grid goes to build new electric substations in towns across the Capital Region, the projects can sometimes be controversial.
Substations are expensive, they can often cost ratepayers more than $10 million to build, and often neighbors get upset if a substation is built near their homes or where their children go to school.
But as New York state increases its renewable energy output as it seeks to remove carbon emissions from its economy, new solar-ready substations are making it easier for solar farm developers to site projects upstate and in the Capital Region.
In fact, the construction of two new substations that National Grid has built in the town of Milton in Saratoga County have helped a solar developer called Active Solar to build two solar farms and plan a third that is in the early planning stages.
“It’s a nice partnership for us,” said Frank Mccleneghen, a lifelong Saratoga County resident and president of Active Solar of Galway, who says that New York state has very clear incentives for solar development and has created substation maps that help it decide where to build solar farms, which benefit from being near substations. “It’s been a big bonus of working in New York.”
As part of its ongoing plan to retire old substations across upstate and replace them with better equipped substations that can handle more capacity, National Grid has built two substations on Lasher Road and Sodeman Road that each add about 25 megawatts of electricity to the system, allowing the utility to retire three smaller, outdated substations.
The Lasher and Sodeman substations also have enough transformer banks to connect to up to five solar farms — each being about 5 megawatts each.
Since solar developers are typically required to pay for upgrades they need for older substations to handle the additional electricity load, the new substations are attractive to developers like Active Solar, which has also built a solar farm outside of Buffalo.
Mccleneghen said Active Solar has built its two solar farms in Milton in a retired
mine and on old junkyard — projects that were extremely attractive to the town not only for the sustainability aspects but also because it enhances the town’s tax base, since solar raises the property values.
The two new substations in Milton cost a total of $33 million and can power up to roughly 28,000 homes, but anyone in National Grid’s upstate service territory can essentially tap into the two new solar farms, which operate under the state’s socalled community solar program. Solar farms power roughly 800 homes per megawatt, so the two solar farms can power about 8,000 homes. Community solar projects, which don’t require out-of-pocket costs like installing rooftop solar, save customers about 10 percent off their electric bills by just signing up.
“It’s a great model,” Mccleneghen said. “It’s getting solar to the people.”
Community solar farms, the dominant model used in New York, generally benefit everyone, National Grid says. The state gets closer to its carbon-free goals, while customers who buy into the solar farms see their rates go down. And solar developers like Active Solar create jobs and make money.
“It’s our vision to be able to provide clean, affordable and fair energy to our customers,” Laurie Poltynski, National Grid’s regional executive for its eastern New York territory, headquartered in Albany. “Nobody gets left behind.”