Silicon Ranch Corporation

Commercial Solar Solutions is hosting a local Solar in Georgetown County, SC, for our Lambert Solar Project this coming Monday, October 21st, from 10am - 2pm at SC Works Waccamaw. This is a fantastic opportunity to learn more about—and get involved in—South Carolina's growing solar sector. See you there!

We are honored to be part of the host committee for the MTSU Charlie and Hazel Daniels Veterans and Military Family Center's Veteran's Breakfast. The Center's mission is to provide education, employment, and health and wellness assistance to service members, veterans, and their families to improve their quality of life.

At Silicon Ranch, we proudly support our American veterans by actively recruiting them as key players in our mission to help make communities stronger, healthier, and more resilient. We believe that veterans bring a unique set of skills and experiences that are not only transferrable but also essential to the work that we do.

A big thanks to a few of our U.S. military veteran team members for representing us this morning.

Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU)

We are proud to announce that our Houston Solar Project is a finalist for the 2024 Solar Builder Project of the Year Award in the ‘Over 10MW’ category! 🌞

This recognition highlights our commitment to innovative and sustainable energy solutions. The Houston Solar Project, a first-of-its-kind dual solar and lambing facility, not only generates reliable energy that EMCs across Georgia count on, but also supports agricultural practices by improving the genetics and resilience of both our company-owned flock as well as the national flock.

We are incredibly proud of our team's hard work and dedication to making solar do more. Now, we need your support! Please take a moment to vote for the Houston Solar Project and help us bring home this prestigious award. Voting closes October 11.

Vote here: https://solarbuildermag.com/projects/vote-project-of-the-year-2024-over-10-mw/

Thank you for your continued support! 🌞🐑

Our thoughts are with our team members and neighbors across the Southeast who were affected by Hurricane Helene this past weekend. We are grateful to say that across all our construction and operating sites, there were no personal injuries due to this storm. However, a number of communities where our sites are located experienced heavy rainfall, flooding, debris, and significant infrastructure damage.

As we continue to track these impacts, we are contributing to the American Red Cross and actively working with our partners to identify and support relief efforts as our communities begin to rebuild in Hurricane Helene’s wake. We also want to take this opportunity to share FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency's link for those seeking information and assistance related to the storm:

Hurricane Helene Disaster landing page for Hurricane Helene 2024.

The latest episode of is now live on all podcast platforms. On this episode, host Nick de Vries is joined by Dan Shugar, the founder and CEO of Nextracker. Dan brings over 30 years of experience in the solar industry to this conversation, with expertise in both the engineering and the business aspects of the sector. Nick and Dan's discussion centers on sustainable innovation; both in the sense of technological innovations that are sustainable for the planet, and also in terms of the business mindset needed to keep innovating over long stretches of time, as Dan and his team have done for decades. Listen here: https://www.siliconranch.com/stories/silicon-ranch-radio-ep-40-solar-tracking-technology/

"Daniel Bell has always dreamed of turning his part-time job as a farmer into a full-time job, and wanted his children to have the opportunity to farm as well. Through this collaboration, he’s worked toward tripling the size of his flock to nearly 1,000 sheep and turn his farm into a full-time, multigenerational operation by creating a year-round shepherding job for his son."

We're proud to see our partnership with the Bell family's Hazelbrook Farm feature in Amazon's latest blog about their support for farmers across the US. Silicon Ranch's 50 MW Turkey Creek Solar Farm in Garrard County, Kentucky, is the state's first utility-scale solar project, and was enabled by Amazon in its pursuit of sustainable business practices.

Offering grazing services to Silicon Ranch on the Turkey Creek Solar Farm has allowed Daniel to grow his flock to a scale that supports his son's ambitions to remain at work year-round on the family farm. His story is a shining example of how hashtag is making the economics of small-scale, regenerative agriculture work for family farms across the nation. Read the full story here: https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/sustainability/amazon-farms-solar-wind-agrovoltaics-projects

Congratulations to our Nick de Vries and Dylan Sontag on featuring among the winners of the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) American-Made Solar Photo Competition: "Hit Me with Your Sun Shot." Dylan took first prize in the "Solar and Weather" category for his photo demonstrating snow shedding on our Kersey project in Colorado. His photo shows our trackers adjusting to a steeper angle, enabling faster site production recovery. Meanwhile, Nick's photo of our company-owned flock of sheep at our Snipesville Ranch project in Jeff Davis County, Georgia, was the runner-up in the "Agriculture and Solar, Solar in Nature, Solar and Wildlife" Category. You can view both photos below, and see the rest of the winners here: https://www.energy.gov/eere/solar/articles/hit-me-your-sun-shot-photo-contest-winners

Wishing everyone a safe, restful, and relaxing

Silicon Ranch is pleased to announce that our Scotford Solar Project has reached commercial operation near Edmonton, Alberta in Canada. Scotford Solar represents an especially significant milestone in our history because it is the first of our projects to be located outside of the United States.

Built to support Shell's Energy and Chemicals Park near Edmonton, the 58-megawatt (MWac) facility is the largest behind-the-meter solar project in Canada, and the first utility-scale solar project to be built in Alberta's industrial heartland region. The Scotford Solar Project has the ability to supply Shell’s facility with enough renewable energy to power approximately 20% of the refinery’s energy needs for the next 25 years and to provide 100% of its electricity needs at peak capacity.

As with every Silicon Ranch project, this facility will be run according to our distinctive and disciplined business model: we will own, operate, and maintain the project for its entire lifecycle, putting down roots as taxpayers, landowners, and neighbors in local Strathcona County. Read more about the Scotford Solar Project here: https://www.siliconranch.com/stories/silicon-ranch-first-utility-scale-solar-alberta-heartland

Thanks to the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, for hosting Jim Malooley and Bill Johnson of our team last month. Jim and Bill spent the day with instructors and a group of 4th year veterinary students while they vasectomized over 30 rams from our company-owned flock of sheep.

This partnership is a perfect fit for both Silicon Ranch and for the university's College of Veterinary Medicine. Our shepherds benefit from top-line reproductive services while the students are exposed to the needs of larger small ruminant producers -- a specialty that has become less common among veterinarians after decades of very little demand.

We're looking forward to welcoming these students to our DeSoto Solar Farm for a few days of pregnancy scanning in December before they return for a week-long stay during lambing season next Spring.

Silicon Ranch is honored to have been named the #1 Solar Developer in the U.S. by Solar Power World for the second year running. Solar Power World's annual Top Solar Contractors list examines hundreds of solar contractors and developers from across the United States, taking into account all of the services and markets provided for across our sector. We're grateful for this recognition by Solar Power World of our fantastic team, and we'll aim to raise the bar again in 2025. .

Silicon Ranch is honored to share that our Houston Solar Project has been awarded the North American Agrivoltaics Award for "Solar Ranch of the Year" at the 2024 Solar Farm Summit. This award is a testament to the industry-leading work of Loran Shallenberger, Jim Malooley, and the entire team of in-house shepherds that have gone above and beyond to make our Houston Solar Project a nationally recognized hub of agrivoltaics innovation and the genetic improvement of American sheep.

We're grateful to our partners and neighbors in Houston County, Georgia, for their warm welcome and tireless support of this project, which reflects the ambition of local community leaders to carry Houston County's rich agricultural heritage into the future.

The work we're doing at Houston Solar is only just beginning. Our Regenerative Energy® shepherds are making use of the new 26,000 square foot lambing barn onsite to breed and track our genetic improvement flock of sheep. This ambitious initiative aims to foster a genetic strain of sheep uniquely suited to the climate and ecology of our home region in the Southeast, which has historically been hostile to the species. Over the past few weeks, our shepherds have expanded their work to our DeSoto Solar Ranch, where they will seek to replicate their previous successes. You can learn more about the Houston Solar Ranch here: https://www.siliconranch.com/stories/silicon-ranch-invests-big-to-grow-our-company-owned-flock-of-sheep/https://www.siliconranch.com/stories/silicon-ranch-invests-big-to-grow-our-company-owned-flock-of-sheep/

"Agriculture is the foundation of manufactures, since the productions of nature are the materials of art." -- Edward Gibbon

Today we celebrate Juneteenth, a date that commemorates the end of slavery in the United States. On this day, in 1865, the final enforcement of the Emancipation Proclamation was achieved by the Union Army and slavery was brought to an end in the former Confederate states.

Our Houston Solar Project is a FINALIST for the 2024 North American Agrivoltaics Solar Ranch of the Year Award!

The Houston Solar Project is a direct result of our long-term approach to solar and our commitment as a community member and land steward, all under our model of ownership for the long haul. This project aims to redress the two biggest challenges to grazing sheep on solar farms in the Southeast: a scarcity of sheep and shepherds, and the susceptibility of American sheep to Southeastern parasites.

With the largest Katahdin flock enrolled in the National Sheep Improvement Program, our efforts at Houston are not only helping us grow our own flock; they are also providing economically important information to the U.S. sheep industry to improve the genetics and production of the national flock.

You can learn more about the project and vote for it here:
https://agrivoltaicsawards.com/project-nominees -c078-4cc7-9d73-e792075919d2

"It is possible to develop utility-scale solar facilities without taking farmland out of production." -- TACIR Report on Solar Energy Development

The Tennessee Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations (TACIR) has released a report laying out the results of its investigation into solar energy development’s impact on land and communities in Tennessee. The report's authors, who were drawn from state and local government as well as Tennessee's private citizenry, conclude that, when planned and executed thoughtfully and responsibly, solar energy can benefit Tennessee’s land and communities, especially when compared to other types of development. As they write in their own words:

"Currently, TVA plans to add 10,000 megawatts (MW) of solar power generation by 2035 throughout its service area—which includes parts of seven states, not just Tennessee. Even if all these facilities were developed on Tennessee farmland, they would account for approximately 100,000 acres taken out of production, 1% of farmland in the state."

Read more here: https://www.siliconranch.com/stories/tn-commission-finds-solar-no-threat-to-farmland/

"They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them."

-- Robert Laurence Binyon, "For The Fallen"

The cattle rancher is an American icon, and cattle ranching has been a central part of our nation’s landscape, identity, heritage, and economy for centuries. The ability to co-locate cattle ranching with utility solar in a way that is good for solar generation, good for the land, and good for the animal could provide extraordinary environmental, economic, and social benefits to Americans across the country while beginning a new, high-tech chapter in the story of the cowboy and his iconic contribution to American culture and historic land use.

This is what our research program, conducted in concert with the U.S. Department of Energy and stakeholders from across the energy, agriculture, and academic sectors, is all about. By marrying cattle grazing and solar generation on our land, we can provide new opportunities for a revered tradition while we progress on decentralizing the nation’s electricity generation. We hope this initiative helps to create a new career pathway for American cattle ranchers similar to the one we're providing to the growing community of shepherds in rural communities across the country. Read more about the heritage-friendly future of American agriculture that the Cattletracker team is working towards here: https://www.siliconranch.com/cattletracker/