Clearway Energy Group and Clearway Community Solar announced that construction began on the company’s first community solar projects in Illinois. The four community solar farms under construction represent 12 MW of Clearway’s 60-MW Illinois community solar portfolio and are located throughout Illinois. The projects are being constructed by Signal Energy.
“We’re proud of the team and partners who, despite this year’s challenges, were able to safely come together to break ground on Clearway’s first projects in Illinois,” said Craig Cornelius, CEO of Clearway Energy Group. “Community solar serves an important role in achieving the state’s clean energy goals and gives area residents, municipalities and businesses the option to support local clean energy and lower monthly utility bills.”
Today’s announcement represents Clearway’s first projects supported by the Illinois Shines Community Solar Program, which was designed as part of the Future Energy Jobs Act. Clearway’s community solar portfolio in Illinois will create more than 70 jobs during construction as well as permanent positions once operating and represent a significant economic investment in the state.
The projects will be placed in service in 2021. Once complete, the four community solar farms will serve more than 1,800 residential and commercial subscribers in the ComEd service territories in the greater Chicago area and beyond, including Northwestern University and the Village of Fox River Grove.
Earlier this year, Clearway and Northwestern University announced the university’s long-term agreement to purchase energy from this portfolio, becoming Clearway’s first major community solar subscriber in the state. The company also announced in August the completion of its sixth community solar fund, unlocking capital for more community solar construction in Illinois and elsewhere.
Clearway Community Solar is a fully integrated business that manages project development, customer subscriptions, and customer management, becoming a market leader in community solar with more than 200 MW of projects nationwide serving more than 15,000 customers.
With community solar options in both ComEd and Ameren service territories, residents, businesses, and municipalities can support local solar generation in Illinois by subscribing to a Clearway Community Solar farm with no upfront costs and without installing equipment on their property. Participants receive solar bill credits that reduce their utility supply charges, with overall guaranteed savings.
Clearway is actively accepting new subscribers for its community solar projects in development. To learn more, visit clearwaycommunitysolar.com.
News item from Clearway Energy Group
Solarman says
“Today’s announcement represents Clearway’s first projects supported by the Illinois Shines Community Solar Program, which was designed as part of the Future Energy Jobs Act. Clearway’s community solar portfolio in Illinois will create more than 70 jobs during construction as well as permanent positions once operating and represent a significant economic investment in the state.”
Interesting, as the grid goes North and East one hears about capacity as well as resiliency. Which is usually where one gets the utility interjection of the North doesn’t have the sun hours of the South West and several cloudy days in a row would ‘require’ more fossil fueled generation to be constructed and maintained. Then entities like FERC and PJM get into arguments that pundit the MOPR which actually seems to favor fueled or nuclear generation over alternative energy generation. IF you’re a Northern utility and have several cloud or storm days a year, the MOPR actually forces a ‘bottom’ or minimum offer price, this would also force up costs of alternative energy generation, although while generating power, solar PV and wind generation is far cheaper than fueled generation. What happens to the cost of alternative energy with a MOPR cost equivalence? The utility is now faced with an asset that is intermittent at cost or an asset that is 24/7 at cost.
The major thing I see is in the links provided, energy storage is not mentioned, this entity is still using RECs for carbon offsets instead of “real World” energy storage that has stacked grid services for revenue streams in one asset. Since the construction of the so called “big battery” TESLA installed in Australia in 2017, the World utilities can see what an adder energy storage is to a power project. IF one has several cloudy days in the Illinois area, the energy storage system could still be used as a grid regulation asset, even though solar PV harvest is low or non existent during the day.