WEAVERVILLE, N.C. (828newsNOW) — Founded in 1995, Sundance Power Systems will mark three decades of promoting solar energy in Western North Carolina this year.

CEO Dave Hollister, an environmental biology major in college, said he founded the company after a revelation about the future of energy.

“I took some classes and got a really good sense that energy was really gonna be the issue of our time, both from an environmental point of view and an economic point of view,” Hollister explained. “It was really clear, you know, you can’t just keep growing our world, our economies, our populations on a fixed, finite amount of energy.”

Hollister took inspiration from the plants and animals around him.

“I looked around and I was like, oh my god, look at what all these other life forms on this planet are using to create this amazing world that we live in,” Hollister said. “That was really the critical moment when I realized that everything that we see, all the life, all the abundance on the planet, was coming from the energy that the sun was emitting. And it just felt like the answer was right in front of our face, you know?”

The company has been an advocate for alternative, renewable energy ever since. Hollister bought a farm in Madison County and decided to reinvigorate the solar energy scene in WNC.

According to the solar CEO, the community was ready to meet him there.

“There was a lot of the Back to the Land movement of the 70s and 80s. A lot of folks came here,” Hollister said. “There was already a lot of consciousness in our community already.”

Over the years, Sundance has advocated for solar energy in utility commissions, tax credits and community energy boards. The company prides itself on working for the community as much as the company.

“It was not just about building our company, right? It was about building an industry, building a level of consciousness within our community as a whole,” Hollister said. “We’ve spent many years doing outreach and public education. We’ve gone into schools, we have, you know, been part of all the major conversations at the county and city levels.”

When Hollister thinks about the energy industry of the next 30 years, he has a clear vision of what true sustainable power will be.

“If you’re talking climate change or anything like that, this is the way to do it,” Hollister said. “It really is a people power technology.”