Solar farm powering Facebook hosts grazing guests

A solar farm that Walton Electric Membership Corporation depends on to provide electricity to Facebook’s Newton Data Center is now a farm in every sense of the word. When Facebook decided to build its Newton Data Center, the social media giant chose Walton EMC as the power supplier. One of the deciding factors in picking the co-op is that it could meet Facebook’s desire for 100 percent renewable energy to power the facility. Walton EMC then partnered with Silicon Ranch, one of the largest independent solar power producers in the country, to build and deliver some of that renewable energy. Their resulting 1,200-acre solar farm is located in Early County, which is primarily an agricultural community. It turns out that those 1,200 acres are producing more than solar electricity. Once solar panels are installed on a tract of land, the land underneath typically goes idle. It’s usually mowed, but any agricultural production or cultivation ceases. Silicon Ranch has changed that. Their Early County site is the first new build to incorporate the company’s holistic Regenerative Energy platform.