The Grinch may try to steal Christmas, but Old Santee Canal has enough spirit to light it up again.

Who knew you’d be able to be green during the holiday’s and not be charged with being the Grinch? The folks at Santee Cooper are helping out this year.

A report by the Post and Courier says Old Santee Canal Park is opening Celebrate the Season, a one-mile drive-thru light display, intended not only to help visitors celebrate the holidays, a fundraiser for local charities, but also a energy efficient activity for residents.

“It’s just another opportunity for something to do during the holidays,” said park director Troy Diel, who has been planning the show since January.

Diel said the park held a one-day holiday market last year and expected a modest outcome, but instead thousands of people showed up. “That was when we decided to expand it,” he said. “The response from the community has been 100 percent excitement.”

Diel said park officials and employees from Santee Cooper, which owns the park, studied the infrastructure to determine the placement of the 50 giant displays, including 40 new ones and some from last year.

“We have some small displays we made ourselves, but we had to look through a catalog to choose the new ones,” he said. “It’s difficult to do this when you talk about going from a one-day event to 34 days.”

What’s makes the displays even more difficult may be that the entire display is totally energy efficient. All of the displays use LED lights, which are 90 percent more efficient than traditional lights.

In addition, the show is powered by Santee Cooper Green Power, which is generated by South Carolina renewable resources, such as landfill gas, solar and wind energy, adding even more “green” to the holidays.

But, it’s not just a light show, it’s also musical entertainment, food, marshmallow roasts, arts and crafts, 8-foot-tall wooden holiday cards made by Berkeley County school groups, and visits with Santa on the weekends.

“It really represents the community coming together in the spirit of the season. It’s a new community tradition that we hope will bring people back throughout this season and in years to come,” Diel said.