We the undersigned citizens of Chesapeake and the surrounding communities support the development of solar power in our city as a clean renewal energy resource. Solar power generation is compatible with the Comprehensive Plan objectives of encouraging the development of alternative energy sources and improving local air quality by reducing fossil fuel “smokestack” emissions across the state. Solar energy will reduce environmental degradation in Virginia and neighboring states caused by mountaintop removal mining, the disposal of new coal ash, the contamination of rivers from mining and fracking, and air pollution.

Utility scale solar energy production - solar farms - will provide our city with cost-effective solutions while providing agricultural farm owners with options to increase their financial opportunities while safeguarding their land from permanent development. Many neighboring cities have seen unfettered encroachment within their rural areas. Solar power farms are a lower impact use of the land, reducing the pressure for residential development.

Restricting solar farms to land zoned Industrial will have negative consequences. Acquiring existing industrial land is very costly and will make solar energy much more expensive, thus causing us to continue to use energy sources that cause far greater destruction to the our air, water, natural areas, and ultimately our health. Re-zoning currently agricultural land as industrial will, almost literally, pave the way for that land to be used much more intensively in the future. The advantage of the solar farm was that it was relatively low intensity and allowed the land to be used for other options, including farming, in the future.