Madison Gas and Electric on Thursday received approval from state regulators to purchase a portion of a massive solar array and battery storage facility planned for 2,400 acres near Cambridge.
The utility said the 30 megawatts of energy and 16.5 megawatts of battery storage from the Koshkonong Solar Energy Center will move it closer to its goal of producing energy that doesn’t put additional carbon into a warming atmosphere.
As regulators rewrite Wisconsin’s nearly 20-year-old rules on customer-owned electricity generation, clean energy advocates worry they are not addressing flaws that allow utility companies to stymie rooftop solar installations.
“The Koshkonong Solar Energy Center continues the progress we’ve already made reducing carbon emissions, increasing cost-effective renewable energy and advancing new technologies to benefit all our customers,” MGE chairman, president and CEO Jeff Keebler said in a statement.
The utility’s goal is to reduce its carbon emissions by at least 80% from 2005 levels by 2030 and to get to net-zero carbon electricity by 2050.
People are also reading…
The $649 million project in the towns of Christiana and Deerfield in Dane County will be made up of a 300-megawatt solar array and a 165-megawatt battery storage system. It is expected to generate enough clean energy to power about 90,000 households.
We Energies and Wisconsin Public Service, both subsidiaries of WEC Energy Group, will own the rest of the facility. Invenergy LLC is slated to start building the project in October, and it’s expected to begin producing energy in late 2025, although the town of Christiana has sued to overturn the state Public Service Commission’s approval of the project.
The Koshkonong Solar Energy Center is one of three announced investments by MGE in large-scale solar energy and battery storage. MGE also will own a 10% share of the Paris Solar-Battery Park and the Darien Solar Energy Center, both of which are under construction.
