Emergent Solar Energy has completed nine on-site solar projects for Handsome Brook Farms, a producer of organic pasture-raised and free-range eggs.
Pasture-raised hens forage beside a ground-mount solar array at the Schlabach family farm, one of nine on-farm solar systems Emergent Solar Energy completed for Handsome Brook Farms. (Photo provided by Bryan Lemon/ Handsome Brook Farms)
Jessica Coslow, director of pasture management at Handsome Brook Farms, said, “Handsome Brook Farms is investing in the long-term success and resilience of our network of family farmers. Our brand has always been centered around supporting small family producers.”
The 579.7-kW portfolio spans facilities in Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky and now generates on-site power that lowers electricity costs and strengthens energy resilience across the company’s organic egg production operations.
Josiah Troyer, a Handsome Brook Farms producer from Sugarcreek, Ohio, said the results have exceeded expectations.
“From the beginning, I have been extremely pleased with what we accomplished with Handsome Brook Farms and Emergent Solar Energy,” Troyer said. “Their teams stayed in constant communication and focused on the specifics of our farm to develop, design, procure, deliver and install a solar system that reduced our yearly electric bill by 74.23%. Since it was placed in service, the system has maintained 100% uptime and solar production.”
“On-farm solar has moved from a sustainability gesture to a core capital decision for agricultural producers,” said Jeremy Lipinski, founder and CEO of Emergent Solar Energy. “Across these nine Handsome Brook Farms projects in Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky, we deployed on-site energy infrastructure that converts rising, unpredictable utility operational expense into a fixed, owned capital expenditure asset. As egg and livestock production continues to electrify, on-site solar is the most direct lever producers have to protect margins and control their long-term cost of energy.”
News item from Emergent Solar Energy
