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Solar projects are popping up in every county within the region, both big and small. Some, if approved, would cover hundreds of acres, while others would fit in less than 50. But one thing each of the projects have in common is a pitch made by the groups in charge. Each one says they want to be environmentally friendly, to blend in. That’s being proposed in several ways, but Dominion Energy is the only group to actually test their proposal in practice, using a Buckingham operation to do it. 

Black Bear Solar went operational in September 2023. This 13-acre facility in Dillwyn generates about 1.6 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 400 homes at peak output. This electricity is going onto the electric grid and supplying energy to all Dominion customers in Virginia, company officials say. In addition to solar panels, you’ll find beehives on the property. 

The project’s purpose is to help increase the pollinator population and local farmers’ crop production. The world’s pollinator population has been declining for decades and is critical to crop production. As bees are one of the most important pollinators, Dominion looks to see if the hives can co-exist with the solar farm. Will it work? Research released by the U.S. Department of Energy back in 2022 found that in test cases both in Georgia and Illinois, bees thrived for years around the solar panels. A 2019 study by Yale found that bees operating around solar increased crop yield due to pollination. The study showed that by making the plants and other “ground cover” pollinator-friendly, it created a cooler microclimate, which helped increase solar panel efficiency. 

Dominion Energy adds agriculture to solar 

The pilot is part of Dominion Energy’s efforts to add agricultural uses to its solar farms, a concept known as agrivoltaics. If the phrase sounds familiar, it’s because the concept has been one of central focus in the hearing for Gabriel Solar, the massive 539 acre proposal by Energix in nearby Prince Edward. However, that is still very much on the theoretical side. Dominion, meanwhile, started their Black Bear test project tthis past fall. Dominion started off with installing four beehives at Black Bear. Each hive has about 45,000 European honeybees and one queen bee, for a total of around 180,000 bees.

“We’re very excited to welcome bees to Black Bear,” Dominion spokesperson Tim Eberly said. “The beehive project is an ideal pairing for a solar farm. Both are environmentally friendly, so we’re generating clean pollution-free energy at Black Bear while helping increase the pollinator population to the benefit of nearby farmers.”

The beehive pilot follows another project, initiated last year, to put sheep on solar farms to eat the grass and vegetation. If all goes well, Dominion Energy hopes to double the number of hives to eight by the spring. Black Bear can support as many as 24 hives.

Dominion enlisted the help of an experienced beekeeper, Chuck Burden of Mountain House Apiaries, to install and tend to the beehives.

Before doing so, Burden made sure the solar farm and surrounding area had sufficient food sources for the bees and that no neighboring farms use harmful pesticides or other chemicals. He also ensured that the addition of the hives wouldn’t overpopulate the area’s pollinator population. Dominion is also exploring whether other solar farms would be well-suited to house beehives.

What’s the impact? 

So is a solar farm a good location to house bees? The project will be there for 40 years. Will that affect the colony at all? The answer is no. 

“The gist of it is that having bees on a solar farm is not an issue for the honeybees and pollinators in general,” said Mary Jane Morgan from Heart of Virginia Beekeepers. “Research shows that electromagnetic fields from high power poles do not have an impact. The solar panels are not attractive to bees and the other structures are not a problem.” 

Morgan added that many solar farms are trying to plant a variety of plants around the panels. These plants are floral sources for bees and other pollinators, so even if there wasn’t a hive nearby, the bees would likely still visit the area.  The only thing she cautioned was how workers maintaining Black Bear approach the hive. 

“Workers who maintain the solar farm might do well to be cautious or aware of the fact that bees might react as any animal would to intrusion by a stranger, but nothing that can’t be handled,” Morgan said. “The fact that in some cases a forest of trees or a productive farm that produced plants was removed to put in the solar farm does raise the question of whether enough floral sources can be planted to replace the amount of pollen and nectar that was once there, but once the solar farm is built, the structures and activity are not an issue for bees.”