Morrison County has given a green light to a plan to build a solar farm east of Little Falls. The 10-megawatt project is one of several large-scale solar farms expected to be built in Central Minnesota in the next few years.
Geronimo Energy is the company behind the Morrison County project, which will operate under the subsidiary Lindy Solar. The solar farm encompasses 70 acres near Minnesota Highway 27 in Little Falls Township.
Geronimo is the same company behind a distributed solar project chosen by state regulators last year in a competitive bidding process to provide electricity for Xcel Energy. The 100-megawatt Aurora Solar Project includes about 24 solar farms around the state, with three in Stearns County and one in Benton County.
The Morrison County solar farm isn’t part of the Aurora project, said Nathan Franzen, director of solar for Geronimo. The company is negotiating an agreement with Minnesota Power to purchase the electricity.
“Ideally, we’d like to have it under construction by as early as next year or 2016,” Franzen said.
Geronimo and landowner James Koetter applied for a conditional-use permit to establish the solar farm, which will include 300-watt photovoltaic (PV) panels about 10 feet high.
The Lindy project is comparable in size to some of the proposed Aurora solar farms, including two 10-megawatt farms near Paynesville and Albany.
State and local government officials are gearing up for the anticipated boom in solar energy. Morrison County didn’t have any regulations for solar farms in its land-use ordinance when it was approached by Geronimo, which meant they weren’t allowed, said Amy Kowalzek, planning and zoning administrator.
“The board decided that they wanted to enable people to initiate these solar projects,” Kowalzek said.
The county adopted new standards in March. The conditional-use permit was approved without any opposition, Kowalzek said.
Read the full article by Kirsti Marohn of the St. Cloud Times >>
