When Dartmouth joined forces with a new nonprofit group a few years ago to improve its cross country ski trails and build the Oak Hill Outdoor Center, it also saw solar power as part of the solution.

Thanks to support from Kathy Reilly Gross ’85 and Mark Gross ’85 and their family, solar arrays at Oak Hill power the snowmaking and lights along the trails, which are on land owned by Dartmouth and the Hanover Improvement Society.

Matt Rightmire, Tuck ’96, the co-founder and treasurer of Friends of Oak Hill, the nonprofit that operates the facility, notes that it is used by Dartmouth Nordic teams and other students, Upper Valley residents, and high school cross country teams.

It’s the only Nordic facility in New England, Rightmire says, that has all its solar generation on site and is fully electric-powered for its snowmaking and night-lighting.

Since monitoring began, the solar panels have generated 38,872 kilowatt hours of clean energy, enough to offset more than 52,000 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions, according to meters on the Oak Hill site.