ALBANY — The 50-megawatt Albany Solar Project in Green County is part of Alliant Energy’s Clean Energy Blueprint, a strategic road map to cost-effectively accelerate our transition to renewable energy and reduce carbon emissions. Once complete, the project will positively impact the environment and generate enough energy to power around 13,000 homes.
Construction update
The Albany Solar Project marked a significant milestone this summer as construction crews installed the first solar panel. Once complete, the site will have approximately 120,000 solar panels.
“This first panel placement would not have been possible without the support of the community and our local construction partners,” said Tim Kreft, senior manager of strategic projects at Alliant Energy. “This is an incredible milestone for Alliant Energy’s solar development in Wisconsin as we continue to make smart investments in a cleaner, safer and more affordable energy future.”
Installation of piles, the metal posts that support the solar arrays, is 100% complete. The tracking system goes across piles horizontally to hold solar panels; trackers, or motors, are the components that rotate panels with the sun. As of early September, tracking system installation is 100% complete as well, and crews have installed approximately 60% of the solar panels.
As they continue to install solar panels, they also install DC cables that carries electricity from panels to inverter boxes. They’re finished installing underground AC cables to carry electricity from the inverters to the substation.
They expect the Albany Solar Project to be operational this winter.
Can agriculture and solar complement each other?
To explore the possibilities of a mutually beneficial relationship between solar generation and agriculture,
Alliant Energy is investing in agrivoltaics, the study of crop or livestock production underneath or adjacent to solar panels. Alliant works with Iowa State University (ISU) and UW-Madison on cutting-edge projects to advance research in this field.
“As renewable energy grows, it’s important to find opportunities for these projects to benefit people beyond just providing renewable electricity,” said Anne Kimber, director of ISU’s Electric Power Research Center. “There’s good work to be done on this front and we hope this research and demonstration will help identify the potential for communities to benefit from agrivoltaics.”
The 10-acre project with ISU, just south of Ames, Iowa, will use tracking and nontracking panels at differing heights to determine the effects on energy, crop and beekeeping production. UW-Madison will conduct similar research on a roughly 15-acre site at its Kegonsa Research Campus.
Learn more about these efforts at alliantenergy.com/agrivoltaics.
Celebrating International Workers’ Day
In education, transportation, manufacturing and many other industries, labor unions have influenced how the world works today. Labor unions also play a crucial role in efforts to put energy on the grid.
“Unions protect workers’ rights and their best interests,” said Dillon Gorman, business manager of IBEW Local 965. “They exist so workers have a voice.”
May 1 is International Workers’ Day. Learn more about Gorman’s story at
alliantenergy.com/
internationalworkersday.
Find out what’s next
Additional updates, photos and details about the Albany Solar Project throughout the construction process are shared online at alliantenergy.com/albanysolar.