It is always good news when previously unusable plots of land become sites for renewable energy. Bridgeport, Connecticut will soon be home to a 5 MW solar and fuel-cell power plant. After months of discussions, the Connecticut Siting Council finally approved the Green Energy Park, which will sit atop a dormant landfill located near Seaside Park.
The project should have approval from United Illuminating by the spring which will allow groundbreaking to follow soon after. The system will consist of 9000 solar panels, which would equate to about 2.2 MW. The fuel-cell system would cover 2.8 MW. You can check out some renderings of what the system would look like from various locations around the city here. It won’t change the landscape much to the eye, but it will do so much for both the city of Bridgeport, as well as the state of Connecticut by increasing the usage of clean energy.
Bill Finch, the mayor of Bridgeport, states, “We are making use of this [landfill] by making it a bastion for green job creation, making it a tax revenue generator for the city that power thousands of homes with clean energy, while also ensuring that our kids breathe cleaner air.”
Bridgeport will join the city of Hartford, which recently installed a 1 MW system on a landfill and can be seen in the photo above.