adopted ordinance.

The Beaufort County Board of Commissioners adopted that ordinance during its meeting last week.

The ordinance, adopted by a 5-2 vote, requires solar collectors and electrical appurtenances to be set back at least 50 feet from all property lines, at least 50 feet from any right of way of any public or private dedicated subdivision road and at least 100 feet away from any residence or business. It also requires an evergreen vegetative buffer adjacent to any residential or commercial structure that fall within 100 feet of the setback boundary, with the buffer extending 35 feet in each direction from the center of such a structure, thus screening a total of 70 feet opposite the structure.

Voting for the ordinance were commissioners Hood Richardson, Stan Deatherage, Gary Brinn, Robert Belcher and Al Klemm. Voting against it were board Chairman Jerry Langley and Commissioner Ed Booth,

A buffer must be a minimum of 4 feet tall when planted and reach 6 feet in height by five years after being planted.

The original proposed ordinance required a 75-foot setback from the right-of-way line on a road, a 50-foot setback from a property boundary line and 100-foot setback from a residence or business. It also included a requirement for a vegetative buffer around an energy project, such as a solar farm, that reaches 6 feet in height within five years of the buffer being planted.

The impetus for developing the proposed ordinance surfaced earlier this year when Paul Woolard, who lives next to the solar-farm project at White Post, complained to commissioners about the project’s effects on his property.

After hearing Woolard’s complaints and discussing the matter, the board, with a unanimous vote, directed county staff to request the White Post solar-farm developers — SunEnergy1 and Duke Energy Renewables — to find a new entrance to the project to prevent further damage to Woolard’s property.

“It’s an eyesore thing. It’s never going to be attractive. What we are trying to do is soften it as much as we possibly can,” Brinn said about the aesthetics of a solar farm.