Competitive Power Ventures flipped the switch this week on the 160-megawatt Backbone Solar project in Garrett County, turning a long-shuttered coal mine into Maryland’s single largest source of solar power and delivering clean electricity to an estimated 30,000 homes.
Developed by the Maryland-based subsidiary CPV Renewable Power and backed by real-estate investment firm Harrison Street Asset Management, Backbone Solar began commercial operations on 22 December 2025. The array of roughly 324,000 photovoltaic panels now stretches across disturbed mining land near Kitzmiller, setting a precedent for how brownfield sites can be reborn as engines of the clean-energy economy.
The project’s scale and location make it a national case study in energy transition. By rehabilitating a fossil-fuel scar and replacing it with a renewable energy hub, CPV and its partners have married environmental remediation, economic development, and Maryland’s ambitious climate goals in one high-profile buildout. State and county officials hope the playbook can be replicated on other industrial sites across Appalachia.
CPV Chief Executive Officer Sherman Knight said the company faced logistical hurdles typical of brownfield redevelopment but relied on “innovative engineering and strategic partnerships” to deliver the facility on schedule and on budget. “By transforming exhausted coal mine land into a productive solar facility, we’re demonstrating how brownfield redevelopment, innovative engineering, and strategic partnerships can meet complex project challenges,” Knight noted in a statement carried by Garrett County’s economic-development office business announcement.
What Backbone Solar Adds
- Capacity: 160 MW (with a second construction phase expected to lift output to 175 MW)
- Site: Former coal mine in western Maryland’s Garrett County
- Equipment: Approximately 324,000 solar panels installed by Vanguard Energy Partners
- Output: Enough electricity for about 30,000 average Maryland homes
- Grid impact: In-state generation that reduces reliance on imported power during peak demand
According to CPV, power generated on the reclaimed land feeds directly into the regional Mid-Atlantic grid, supporting Maryland’s target of sourcing 50 percent of its electricity from renewable resources by 2030. While the state legislature continues to refine policy tools to meet that mandate, private-sector investments like Backbone Solar are viewed as essential building blocks.
Community and Economic Benefits
Garrett County officials, keen to diversify an economy historically tied to energy extraction and timber, welcomed the solar farm’s launch. County Commissioner Board Chair Paul Edwards said Backbone Solar “protects our natural landscape while creating economic opportunities for local residents,” including construction jobs and a long-term operations crew. CPV has pledged $100,000 over four years to the Deep Creek Watershed Foundation, earmarked for water-quality and conservation projects in the county’s tourism-driven lake region.
The conversion delivers tangible benefits: elimination of lingering liabilities associated with an abandoned mine, reduced erosion into nearby streams, and a cleaner skyline for communities once bordered by coal overburden. Reusing disturbed land also prevented the clearing of forested acreage elsewhere, aligning with statewide conservation priorities.
How the Project Came Together
CPV formally proposed the solar farm in 2021 after securing lease agreements on the mine lands and interconnection rights with the regional transmission operator PJM. Harrison Street, which specializes in infrastructure and social-impact real-assets, supplied equity financing deemed crucial for a brownfield project that did not qualify for some of the tax incentives reserved for greenfield builds.
Vanguard Energy Partners, a New Jersey-based engineering, procurement, and construction contractor, broke ground in late 2023. Crews had to reinforce subsurface areas weakened by past extraction tunnels and neutralize acid-mine drainage before driving posts for panel racks. An unusually heavy snow season in early 2024 paused grading work, but the project regained momentum in spring, according to CPV’s construction updates.
Delivering Power to the Grid
Backbone Solar interconnects at a nearby 138-kilovolt substation, exporting output under long-term power-purchase agreements with regional utilities and corporate buyers seeking renewable-energy credits. CPV did not disclose contract pricing, but industry analysts note utility-scale solar power in the Mid-Atlantic now clears auctions at roughly three to four cents per kilowatt-hour, competitive with combined-cycle natural gas.
Once commissioning tests wrapped up on 22 December, CPV announced that “Maryland’s largest solar farm is now online,” highlighting the milestone in a press release carried by Electrek. Yahoo Finance echoed the news, noting that the company had “repurposed former coal-mine land to deliver clean, renewable energy to the state of Maryland” finance report.
Phase Two and CPV’s Broader Pipeline
A second tranche of panels, already under procurement, is slated to boost capacity to 175 MW by late 2026, giving the site enough output to serve roughly 34,000 homes. Backbone Solar joins three other operating wind and solar facilities in CPV’s portfolio and sits within a 4.8-gigawatt development pipeline extending from New England to the Midwest.
The company’s experience on the Garrett County site is expected to inform forthcoming proposals that target disused industrial parcels—surface mines in Pennsylvania, fly-ash ponds in Ohio, and underutilized railyards near Baltimore—where grid proximity and land availability intersect.
Environmental Significance
Backbone Solar’s significance extends beyond megawatts. Coal mines leave behind soil compaction, contaminated runoff, and visual blight. Converting the land to solar required earthwork to regrade slopes, install stormwater controls, and plant pollinator-friendly ground cover beneath the panels. CPV’s environmental consultants project a net reduction of more than 170,000 metric tons of carbon-dioxide emissions annually compared with a coal plant generating the same electricity—equivalent to taking roughly 37,000 gasoline-powered cars off the road.
Analysis and Outlook
Backbone Solar illustrates two converging trends expected to define the next decade of American energy development: brownfield solar and community-based decarbonization. Brownfield sites typically come with lower land-acquisition costs and existing grid infrastructure, making them attractive as federal and state incentives encourage renewable buildouts close to load centers. Yet they also present engineering and environmental challenges that can erode returns without creative financing and public-private coordination.
Maryland’s milestone aligns with a broader Appalachian narrative in which states with deep fossil-fuel histories are leveraging energy expertise and transmission assets to attract clean-tech investment. For local communities, the shift promises not only cleaner power but also stable tax bases once threatened by mine closures. The success of Backbone Solar could bolster support for similar conversions in neighboring West Virginia and Pennsylvania, where thousands of acres of mine lands remain idle.
Challenges remain. Interconnection queues across the PJM territory are congested, and supply-chain volatility continues to add uncertainty to solar-component pricing. Policymakers will need to streamline permitting and maintain predictable incentive structures to ensure that projects like Backbone Solar move from concept to completion on industry timelines.
For now, the sunlit expanse that replaced Garrett County’s coal pits stands as evidence of what deliberate collaboration can accomplish: a cleaner grid, rejuvenated land, and a glimpse of how yesterday’s energy infrastructure can power tomorrow’s economy.
Sources
- https://business.garrettcountymd.gov/key-industries/news/2025-12/cpv-begins-operations-marylands-largest-solar-project
- https://electrek.co/2025/12/22/maryland-largest-solar-farm-is-now-online-on-a-former-coal-mine/
- https://finance.yahoo.com/news/cpv-begins-operations-maryland-largest-155100206.html
