All Local, All The Time
All Local, All The Time
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March's lineup of lectures, music, and dancing at the Left Hand Grange offers the public many ways to connect to others in the local community both in the past and present. Also, watch for more news soon, but for now here's a tease to let Home on the Grange readers know that more aesthetic upgrades to the Grange are in the making. Lucky Niwot Day at the Grange Free Irish Folk Dance Session Saturday, March 9, 4:00 - 6:00 p.m. Celebrate Lucky Niwot Day at the Grange with a fun and free drop-in...
On Thursday, May 18, Governor Jared Polis signed climate legislation into law at Jack's Solar Garden near Niwot. Jack's Solar Garden, located on 95th Street between Niwot and Longmont, serves as a national model for governments, solar developers, and farmers for how to produce renewable energy while continuing agricultural production via agrivoltaics. In fact, it is the largest commercially active research site for agrivoltaics in the USA. Agrivoltaics is the co-location of agriculture and...
On Feb. 16, the Boulder County Community Planning & Permitting staff held a zoom meeting to discuss composting solutions for local farmers. The meeting was led by Sustainable Agriculture Planner Sabrina Torres and Long Range Planner Andrea Vaughn. "Compost helps reduce waste and mitigate climate vulnerabilities," said Torres. "It's really rather than sending food and yard scraps to a landfill, composting upcycles these resources into an environmentally beneficial product and these materials woul...
Chuck Rodgers knows a thing or two about electricity. He worked for Xcel Energy for nearly four decades. For the last 36 years he's switched on a massive holiday light show in his front yard as a gift to the community and to raise money for Longmont Meals on Wheels. And on Tuesday, Dec. 6, the Boulder County Commissioners approved a five-megawatt, 24-acre solar farm on his property. The Project In August 2022, following a Boulder County Planning Commission hearing as part of a Special Use...
A sweet Saturday is on tap as the Honey Bee Harvest Festival brings swarms of family-friendly activities, goodies and know-how to Niwot. The second-annual event expands on last year's festivities with a full schedule from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. downtown and in Cottonwood Square. "Seems like there are so many topics to share," co-organizer Victoria Keen said. "The more I learned, the more I was amazed." The fascinating story of bees will be shared through a speaker series at the Left Hand Grange....
Good morning, Courier readers! April 22nd is a special day to celebrate our nurturing, Mother Earth. And while tackling climate change might seem daunting at times, we mustn’t give up hope. So, without further ado, here is a comprehensive list of all things you can do to turn your climate anxiety into climate action! At home and other individual actions: *Switch to a more eco-friendly search engine like Ecosia. Ecosia plants trees for every 45 searches you make on the web. It’s the world’s largest not-for-profit search engine and is endor...
Jack's Solar Garden is seeking applicants to fill two community-focused roles for 2022. The family-owned solar garden, which is located between Niwot and Longmont off of North 95th Street, recently posted a call for their 2022 Artist on the Farm program and opened a position for an agrivoltaics education specialist at the farm's non-profit Colorado Agrivoltaic Learning Center (CALC). Agrivoltaics, or the practice of growing crops in conjunction with solar panels, is Jack's Solar Garden's unique...
August is the month when gardens prove their worth. If produce, flowers, and pollinators are thriving, the tender of a garden is delighted. This first full summer of cultivating at Jack's Solar Garden is turning out to be excellent according to owner/manager Byron Kominek. In addition to providing solar energy to 300 homes, the garden is successfully growing squash, tomatoes, beans, and then some under and around its 3,200 solar panels. Two hundred pounds of fresh produce was recently donated to...
Spring is always a busy time for gardeners, and this year Jack's Solar Garden is finding the season to be super-charged with activity. Last March Jack's, the largest U.S. commercially active agrivoltaic system, was just preparing to have 3,200 solar panels installed. What a difference a year makes. By November 2020 the system was up and running, and now it's nearly 100% sold out, seeds for grasses and wildflowers have been spread, a unique 2021 Artist on the Farm has been selected, a grant for...
Boulder County's first solar garden is an inherent composite of nature, community, and pure inspiration. Jack's Solar Garden, a 1.2 megawatt solar array on north 95th Street, switched on operations officially the first week of November 2020. The project's power is now flowing both literally and creatively. Called agrivoltaics because of the combination of agriculture and solar power, Jack's is the largest operation of its kind in the U.S. and from the start, founder Byron Kominek envisioned...
For several months, artist Rachael Scala visited Jack's Solar Garden weekly to gain inspiration for a series of large scale multimedia sculptural pieces of art. Her process was time and resource intensive. Throughout the spring and summer, Scala, who lives in Nederland, worked to build a series of six pieces of art, the first show created through the farm's new artist-in-residence program. Her path to this point involved her passion for permaculture, and part time work for a biodynamic...
Jack's Solar Garden met several milestones over the past few months. The experimental agrivoltaic farm and solar power plant in South Longmont on 95th Street is on track to start delivering power from Colorado sunshine to local households and organizations through Xcel Energy's grid. Almost all of the solar panels have been installed on land that had been used to grow grass and alfalfa for the past 30 or 40 years, according to Jack's Solar Garden founder and owner Byron Kominek. The timing is...
Here is a ray of sunshine in these dark times; a ray of sunshine, shining on a solar panel, producing energy locally in Longmont for residents of the Left Hand Valley. Jack's Solar Garden, the community solar project created by Byron Kominek on his farm in south Longmont, is on track to be built, connected, and producing power by fall. In early April, Kominek signed a contract with Namasté Solar to build the panels. Namasté is a local solar developer, and as Kominek pointed out, also a c...
Boulder County has committed to be the biggest subscriber to date in Jack's Solar Garden. As of Nov. 5, the county commissioners pledged to be a holder of 10% of the 1.2 megawatts solar array, equalling a $376,000 investment. Jack's will be the first and only solar garden in the county and the largest commercial agrivoltaic system in the U.S. Jack's Solar Garden founder Byron Kominek said, "Having the confidence of Boulder County in becoming an anchor tenant and having them fully appreciate the social and environmental benefits we intend to...
To the editor: There is no climate emergency! Those are not my words, but rather the words of 500 of the world's most knowledgeable and experienced scientists and professionals in climate related field. This information was sent to the United Nations Secretary General and the Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change on September 23rd, 2019 urging them to reconsider their stance on climate change. Their letter remarks that "the general-circulation models of climate on which international policy is at...
If you look forward to perfect peppers, but are disappointed when they get sunburn, there aren’t as many as you thought, or they aren’t as big as you’d like, chances are that you have sunlight to blame. High solar intensity and temperatures work against getting the most out of our pepper crops. Research on shading peppers is casting light on the benefits of cooling things off a bit on leaves and the root zone. Heat stress reduces the plant’s ability to photosynthesize and cool itself efficie...
Jack’s Solar Garden will now have its place in the sun. On June 13, Boulder County Commissioners unanimously gave their approval for co-owner Byron Kominek to commence with plans to build the county’s first of its kind co-mingling of solar power and agriculture. The farm property, which has been in Kominek’s family for three generations, is located at 8102 N. 95th Street, Longmont. Commissioner Deb Gardner was the first to move to approve the solar garden, stating, “This is certainly the dir...
On May 15, the Boulder County Planning Commission unanimously recommended 8-0 that plans to build Jack’s Solar Garden at 8102 95th Street move ahead and be presented to the Boulder County Commissioners on Thursday, June 13. The first of its kind in Boulder County, the five-acre co-habitation of solar energy generation and agriculture is being proposed by Byron Kominek, a third generation owner of the farmland. Kominek successfully passed muster with Boulder County land use staff demonstrating t...
You can't miss the increasing number of nearby fields donning what seem to be modern art installations of shiny black rectangles slanted toward the sun. These masses of photovoltaic panels are solar farms and, while their orderly appearance in place of the usual disarray of plant life is what captures our attention, it's their purpose of collecting power from the sun and converting it to electricity that's truly amazing. But you haven't seen the most awe inspiring type of solar installation yet...
