Vanderbilt Launches its New Solar Energy Farm
Credit: Image Credit: Yaorusheng / Moment / Getty Images- Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., has a goal of being carbon neutral by 2050.
- It also plans to be reliant entirely on renewable energy.
- The Vanderbilt I Solar Farm is a collaboration between 4 partners: Vanderbilt University, Silicon Ranch Corporation, Nashville Electric Service, and Tennessee Valley Authority.
Vanderbilt University is one step closer to its ambitious sustainability goals after activating its new 35-megawatt solar farm.
The private research university in Nashville, Tenn., last week flipped the switch on the Vanderbilt I Solar Farm. The facility located in Bedford County, some 60 miles south of campus, will produce enough electricity to power more than 6,000 homes for one year, enabling it to offset 70% of Vanderbilt’s greenhouse gas emissions from electricity purchased from Nashville Electric Service.
Vanderbilt in 2019 announced plans to power its campus entirely through renewable energy and become carbon neutral by 2050. The solar farm, first announced in 2020 and a big part of that plan, is the result of a collaboration of four partners: Vanderbilt University, Silicon Ranch Corporation, Nashville Electric Service, and Tennessee Valley Authority.
The farm is owned and operated by Silicon Ranch, which invested more than $50 million in the project.
“The Vanderbilt I Solar Farm not only represents a major step toward our own goals at Vanderbilt, but also provides a model of collaborative, forward-thinking solutions that we hope other higher educational institutions will adopt and replicate across this country,” Vanderbilt Chancellor Daniel Diermeier said. “We look forward to the educational and research opportunities this project and our pursuit of carbon neutrality will yield for our faculty and students at Vanderbilt.”