King George Reviewing Application for Solar Farm
Sun Tribe Development has submitted an application for Caledon Solar, a 22-megawatt solar project.
By Adele Uphaus
MANAGING EDITOR AND CORRESPONDENT
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The King George County Department of Community Development is reviewing an application for a special exception permit for a utility-scale solar energy facility.
According to a report prepared by Kelli LeDuc, director of the Community Development department, for a December meeting of the Board of Supervisors, the Caledon Solar project will be located on Tax Map 8, Parcel 1.
The county’s geographic information system map shows that this parcel, which totals 1,431 acres and adjoins Caledon State Park with frontage on the Potomac River, is owned by Richard H. Stuart, a Virginia State Senator who also serves as King George’s interim county attorney.
According to the Caledon Solar website, the 22-megawatt project would “occupy 120 acres and interconnect to an exist Dominion distribution line.”
At the November 18, 2024, Board of Supervisors meeting, County Administrator Matthew Smolnik referred to a solar project that would soon be subject to a public hearing, though he didn’t specify a project name.
He brought up the project as part of a discussion he said he had with Stuart and LeDuc about possibly changing the County Code’s requirements for the posting of signs on properties that will be subject to public hearings.
Section 3-10-3 of the County Code states that notices “must be posted on the subject property no less than 15 days prior to the public hearing” and must be posted every 200 feet on properties with more than 200 feet of street frontage.
“We’ve got a solar farm coming in at 1,000 acres—we could see hundreds and hundreds of signs,” Smolnik said.
He said the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors are about to be “inundated with public hearings” early in 2025 and that “with all the work going into these public hearings, I want to make sure there’s no wasted efforts” for county staff or supervisors.
According to County Code, it is the applicant who is required to post notices of public hearings for rezonings and special exceptions.
County staff are currently reviewing the first submittal of the special exception application for Caledon Solar. It’s not clear when public hearings on the project will be scheduled.
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