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GREENSBORO — The prospects of landing a massive solar farm in the Guilford County  area continue to brighten.

A local economic development official said Wednesday  that representatives of a Florida  company, National Solar Power , have signaled a strong interest in locating a solar farm in the Greensboro  area.

“When they left here (last week), they were very impressed,” said Dan Lynch , president of the Greensboro Economic Development Alliance . “They just feel confident that they are going to be able to develop a solar farm in the Greensboro  region.”

But Lynch added that several significant steps remain before the project could locate here.

“The critical components remain,” Lynch said. “They have to find a suitable site and at the proper price to make the project viable.”

Lynch declined to elaborate further on National Solar Power’s intentions. But he did say that the company would send a site selection team to Greensboro next week to talk with regional economic development officials and look at potential sites.

Those could include an unexpected possibility — a capped portion of the White Street Landfill.

“I am going to recommend that we look at it,” Lynch said. “I would love for their first 40-acre  solar farm to be at White Street Landfill.”

Efforts to reach James Scrivener , the company’s CEO , were unsuccessful Wednesday.

“The company is not at a point of coming to a final decision,” said Ryan Banfill , a National Solar Power spokesman . “It’s weighing its options.”

The Melbourne, Fla. , company announced June 28  that it wants to build “the world’s largest solar farm” and identified Guilford County  as one of seven  finalists. The other potential sites are in Georgia  and Florida.

The $1.4 billion  project would require 4,000  acres and would produce 120  jobs over five years.

Company representatives met with state and local officials here last week to provide more details about the project.

After the meeting, Melvin “Skip” Alston , chairman of the Guilford County Board of Commissioners , said he considered the county the front-runner for the project.

Since then, additional details from the meeting have emerged.

Significant among them:  The company doesn’t need prime real estate to make the project work. Rather, it’s looking for marginal land, including floodplains and landfills.

“I think the public perception was that the company was going to come in and develop 4,000 acres of prime commercial, industrial, residential and high-yielding agricultural sites,” Lynch said. “That won’t be the case.”

The company also said it could build the project in segments as small as 40  acres. That got city officials thinking about including a 39-acre  capped section of the landfill.

“It’s just one of a number of possibilities that they would consider,” said Andy Scott , assistant city manager . “That would be icing on the cake.”

The decision to offer part of the landfill would be up to the City Council , Scott said, adding that officials would want to lease the land rather than sell it.

Scott said a high-power electrical line runs near the landfill, which would make it more desirable as a solar farm site. The company would need the line as a convenient way to connect to the power grid.

The landfill consists of three  phases.

Phase 1 , the oldest, closed in 1978.

Phase 2  is used to dump construction and demolition debris.

Phase 3  has been the center of recent controversy. The City Council is poised to invite companies to operate this section. It will be used to dump household trash for the first time since 2006 , when the city abandoned the practice because of neighborhood concerns.

Staff Writer Amanda Lehmert contributed to this report.

Contact Donald W. Patterson at 373-7027 or don.patterson@news-record.com