COASTAL OBSERVER

An investment firm has delayed its request for approval for Georgetown County’s second large-scale solar farm in the face of opposition from residents and property owners in the Plantersville community.

Sunrise Renewables is seeking zoning approval to build two solar farms on 5,700 acres that it will lease from a timber company. One site will generate up to 213 megawatts of electricity. The other will generate up to 150 megawatts and have a battery storage facility.

Sunrise is owned by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, a global firm that invests in renewable energy projects. Among its projects is Vineyard Wind, an 800 megawatt project off the coast of Massachusetts that is the first large-scale offshore wind farm in the U.S. 

The planning department started receiving complaints about the project, known as the Plantersville Renewable Energy Center, before it received the application for a “solar energy facility floating district,” said Holly Richardson, the county planning director.

It was scheduled for a public hearing before the Planning Commission this week. 

The scores of letters and emails opposing the project came from local residents, owners of plantation and former rice fields along the Pee Dee River and hunters and outdoor enthusiasts from around the Southeast.

“I think they’ve been made aware of some concerns,” Richardson said of the applicants, who told her they plan to present their request in October.

There is a 200 megawatt solar farm under construction in the rural Lambertown community. It was approved by the county in 2023 over the objection of area residents. The developer, Tennessee-based Silicon Ranch, is now seeking to include another 1,000-acre tract in its solar district zoning to generate another 50 megawatts of electricity. 

Silicon Ranch last week asked County Council to defer the second of three required readings for the addition.

“There are some things stirring,” Council Member Everett Carolina, whose district includes the Silicon Ranch property, said. “No one wants to complete it. I’m talking about my colleagues.”

He and Council Member Raymond Newton opposed the creation of the initial Lambertown solar district. But Carolina supports the expansion, which would be the limit of the generating capacity for one site connected to the Santee Cooper grid.

Newton said he has concerns about the site work being done for the approved facility and is not willing to approve a new phase until that it resolved.

Carolina said he has urged Silicon Ranch to offer to make some upgrades to recreation facilities and boat landings in the area to show it is a “good neighbor.”

Having approved one solar district does not oblige the county to approve another, Richardson said. Each has to stand on its own merits.

“Obviously they are in very different areas of the county. There are different surrounding land uses,” she said. “It’s not one-size-fits-all.”

In Plantersville, four miles east of the Waccamaw Neck across two rivers, the 213 megawatt Plantersville North solar farm would abut the Waccamaw National Wildlife Refuge. The smaller Plantersville South facility would be just over a mile from the state’s Samworth Wildlife Management Area.

“The historical elements of Plantersville and the Waccamaw Neck are one of county’s most important drivers of tourism,” the Georgetown County Waterfowl Conservation Group, comprised of 66 landowners, said in a letter. “This project will be a permanent scar on the historical fabric of Georgetown County.”

Craig Sasser, manager of the Waccamaw National Wildlife Refuge, said he is neutral on the proposal, but has asked the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s ecological services office to review it.

“It’s a very rich wetland system that drains through that. It drains through the refuge and into the Pee Dee River,” he said.

Large landowners have improved waterfowl habitat to a level “I haven’t seen in my lifetime,” Sasser said.

And there are concerns for the impact of the project on heritage tourism that the refuge hopes to generate with support from the community.

“How does a solar farm fit into this equation? Is it a harm? Does it matter?” Sasser said.

He isn’t sure. Others say it doesn’t fit.