A West Hartford solar developer is seeking state approval for a 50-megawatt project that would span about 211 acres of farmland, former timberland and an idle gravel pit along the Plainfield-Sterling town line.
Brookfield Husky Solar LLC, a company developed by Verogy Holdings LLC, filed for a certificate of environmental compatibility and public need with the Connecticut Siting Council on Feb. 20. The Husky Solar project would occupy nine parcels totaling 517 acres.
Most of the solar array would be built on 460 acres straddling the town line between Sterling Hill Road and Sterling Road, owned by Bellavance Farm LLC and a related company. A smaller array and the project’s collector substation would sit on 40 acres in Sterling owned by the estate of Charles Corson Jr., a former gravel mining site.
A switchyard would be built on two wooded parcels totaling 17 acres on Sugar Brook Road in Plainfield, about five miles west of the main site. From there, the project would connect to an existing Eversource 115-kilovolt transmission line.
The project was selected in December through the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection’s 2025 Expedited Zero Carbon Energy Procurement, a multistate solicitation DEEP ran with energy regulators in Massachusetts and Maine and a Vermont utility.
Husky Solar would sell all of its electricity and renewable energy certificates to utilities in those three states.
Verogy estimates the project would generate about 87,500 megawatt-hours of electricity annually, enough to power 6,692 homes, while offsetting roughly 38,643 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions a year. The company estimates the project’s greenhouse gas benefits would outweigh its carbon debt within 2.2 years.
But the project’s environmental impact has emerged as the central issue in the Siting Council case.
The project would clear 124 acres of trees, including 45.1 acres classified as core forest, and develop 36 acres containing prime farmland soils. Verogy proposes using 34.4 acres inside the fenced solar array for sheep grazing as mitigation for the loss of farmland.
In May 28 comments, staff from DEEP’s Office of Environmental Review and Strategic Initiatives said the project is expected to affect wetlands and cited concerns about “the loss of core forest.”
DEEP reviewers who walked the sites in March and April found that two homes on Sterling Road would lose the woods that now screen them. Verogy proposed planting a row of shrubs, but DEEP suggested trees instead, or leaving more of the existing forest.
The proposal has also divided Sterling’s Board of Selectmen.
Selectperson Patricia Massey told the Siting Council on April 20 that the project conflicts with the town’s “Last Green Valley” designation and raised concerns about construction traffic near Sterling Community School, which is about 1,350 feet from the project.
First Selectman Myron “Jack” Joslyn later told Verogy that Massey’s letter “was sent solely by Selectman Massey and does not reflect a unified position of the Board of Selectmen,” according to documents filed with the Siting Council.
Verogy co-founder Bryan Fitzgerald responded to Massey’s concerns, saying the solar modules are not hazardous and the company would provide a decommissioning bond as required by state law.
Fitzgerald said Verogy has been in business for 8.5 years and has built 22 ground-mounted solar projects in Connecticut. He acknowledged that Husky Solar would be “a larger site than we’ve built before.”
The Siting Council closed the evidentiary record Aug. 11 after three public sessions that began June 4. The council had been scheduled to issue a decision Wednesday, Aug. 19, but obtained an extension.
If approved, construction would begin in spring 2027 and take 18 to 24 months. The project is expected to be operational in spring 2029.
