CLYMER — The town of Clymer’s first solar project is continuing its march towards a building permit.

Town Board members have approved the last few agreements they have been waiting on receiving for a few months.

During the town board’s February meeting it was discussed that part of the process of RIC Energy being allowed to get a building permit to start work on their solar project site at 1548 Upper Road, includes the company asking the town to review the application again and make sure all of the underlying documents are what was agreed to in the special use permit, which was approved by the town board last May.

Town Supervisor Brian Willink said during that meeting that there are six documents in total that the town has to review, with four being reviewed, discussed and approved by the town in February. In total these documents include the road use agreement, decommissioning agreement, the ESCROW agreement, the community benefit agreement, the visual screening and maintenance agreement and the operation and maintenance plan. The visual screening and maintenance agreement along with the operation and maintenance plan were still in engineering review back in February when the project was last discussed, and have been received and approved by the board now during their April meeting.

“RIC will be providing another $60,000 bond for landscaping and driveway repairs,” Willink said. “That is in addition to the road, $50,000, and decommissioning, $265,000, bonds that are already part of the project.”

With the approval of these documents comes the next steps for RIC Energy to get a building permit for their project. Before a building permit can be granted though, the company still needs to send the town a few more documents, including final construction drawings, a final Emergency Response Plan and security bond, a final SWPPP with phasing plan to remain under five acres disturbance including NOI, and state DEC acceptance, a proposed schedule for construction, final equipment data sheets, evidence of application for interconnection simplification with the utility provider, and pre-construction soil testing, the sampling protocol and results of which shall be submitted for review by the Town’s Designated Engineer, according to an agreement between the town and RIC Energy.

“While we have approved the latest version of the plans for this project, the developer will still need to submit a building permit application to us prior to any development taking place,” Willink said.