Clarkstown's New Solar Field is First in New York Atop a Capped Landfill

By 1997, Clarkstown had stopped dumping town garbage in its West Nyack landfill, and had capped the thing off.

Now, 17 years later, the landfill will be useful again.

A massive solar array has been built on 13 acres of the landfill. It’s the first solar field on a capped landfill in New York state, officials said.

The solar project is a public/private partnership with OnForce Solar, who invested $6 million to install, operate, and maintain the solar installation pursuant to a 20 year Power Purchase Agreement.

The town hasn’t spent a cent. But it will begin getting money—an estimated $4 million over the next 30 years as the solar field produces electricity to be sold back to the Orange&Rockland utility grid.

Putting solar panels on the landfill was the idea of town Councilman George Hoehmann.

“Changes in state law including the net metering law and enhanced incentives made it possible to seek a public private partnership to create the first in the state large scale solar field on a landfill,” he said in a written statement. “The benefits are many and go far beyond environmental, to include predictability and long-term prolonged savings to one of the most volatile areas of our operational budget, namely energy costs.”

At a ribbon-cutting ceremony Oct. 28, Hoehmann, other town officials, OnForce Solar, which built the array, and H2M architects + engineers, the town’s consultants, gathered to express their pleasure at getting the project done.

“We are very proud to be the first municipality in New York to install a solar field on a closed and capped landfill,” Town Supervisor Alex Gromack said.

The solar project is a public/private partnership with OnForce Solar, who invested $6 million to install, operate, and maintain the solar installation pursuant to a 20 year Power Purchase Agreement. OnForce Solar received a multi-million dollar grant from NYSERDA through Governor Cuomo’s NY-Sun initiative.

“Repurposing inactive or unusable land to generate clean energy is a great idea and we applaud the Town of Clarkstown for having the vision and political will to make this ambitious project a reality,” said Gil C. Quiniones, president and CEO of the New York Power Authority. “This project reflects the statewide efforts under the NY-Sun Initiative to make solar energy projects easier to install and more affordable, and we look forward to contributing to the success of similar public-private clean energy partnerships at other New York communities.”

A lot of collaboration went into making this a reality, Gromack said: H2M architects + engineers, the Rockland County Solid Waste Management Authority, NYSERDA, the NYS DEC, Orange and Rockland Utilities, Rockland County Trade Unions, and the New York Power Authority (NYPA).

The NYPA is working on a white paper which should become a blueprint for municipalities to follow on how to implement a large scale solar field and find savings in municipal budgets.

“I look forward to expanding our commitment to renewable energy and seeking additional opportunities for solar in the Town of Clarkstown,” Hoehmann said.