The proposed solar project at the old landfill on Belchertown Road could be completed this year, Town Manager John Musante said this week.

"It's a very ambitious but achievable goal that we have," he said.

Musante told the Select Board that he is preparing to move forward with the project, which Town Meeting last May overwhelmingly supported, giving him authority to lease all or a portion of the landfill to BlueWave Capital for up to 30 years. Musante said he wants to demonstrate that Amherst remains committed to renewable energy.

His confidence comes even though a lawsuit is still pending in Hampshire Superior Court and negotiations for a power-purchase agreement with Blue Wave are ongoing.

The lawsuit, filed by neighbors, hinges on the argument that Amherst, when it capped the landfill in the 1980s, was, like other communities given grants from the Department of Environmental Protection, required to use it for recreation in perpetuity.

Michael Pill, the attorney representing the plaintiffs, said Tuesday that the battleground has now shifted to the state legislature, where in November the state senate unanimously passed a bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Benjamin Dowling D-Pittsfield, that would allow communities to bypass this restriction.

"I'm very concerned that the Amherst town manager has not been willing to discuss that fact," Pill said. "I challenge him to level with the public and make a full disclosure concerning what's going on on Beacon Hill concerning the legislation."

The Ways and Means Committee for the House is preparing to release the Senate bill that would rewrite the language from 1983 and add renewable energy projects as legitimate uses for these capped landfills.

The project, which would install a solar array that would generate up to 4.75 megawatts of power annually for the town, also meets two of the nine performance goals set by the Select Board, that Musante should confront fiscal challenges with a new source of revenue and make the community more sustainable with its energy use.

Solar power at the old landfill, Musante said, can reduce and stabilize electricity costs and provide new taxable property.

Musante said he believes the lawsuit is moving toward a successful resolution, while completing the deal with power-purchase agreement is inching along.

"It's been painstaking, but it's very close," Musante said.

Once the deal is done, BlueWave can move from a conceptual proposal to one that is refined and brought before the state's Department of Environmental Protection and the town's Zoning Board of Appeals for permits, Musante said.