Ohio's renewable energy sector continues to expand following the announcement of two new solar projects over the holidays.
On Dec. 26, ACCIONA Energy said it had begun operations at its 325-megawatt Union Solar Farm in Marysville. The facility, which covers more than 22 square miles and includes 760,000 solar panels, has a long-term power purchase agreement with Amazon.
Another solar farm is planned for northwest Ohio. On Dec. 18, the U.S. Department of Agriculture awarded the Village of Pioneer a grant to develop a solar power generation facility.
Pioneer, located in Williams County, will receive $10.5 million through the USDA’s Powering Affordable Clean Energy (PACE) program. The funding will enable the township to “finance solar facilities that can generate a total of nearly five megawatts of renewable energy in rural Williams County.”
“This is a big deal,” Pioneer Mayor Ed Kidston said, as reported by The Blade. “Electric costs continue to rise across the land and this project will help us reduce costs dramatically in the part of our bill taking the biggest spike: transmission and capacity charges.”
A local generation source would reduce transmission costs for Pioneer, but according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, building solar facilities remains significantly more expensive than constructing new natural gas plants.
The cost of building a new solar facility is $6,776 per kilowatt of capacity, compared to $1,453 per kilowatt for a new combined-cycle natural gas plant. While solar facilities have higher fixed maintenance and operational costs, their variable costs are lower because they have no fuel expenses.
These two new projects add to Ohio’s growing solar capacity. With 3,224 megawatts of installed solar capacity, Ohio ranks 14th in the nation, up from 32nd in 2022.
Currently, 12 new solar projects are under construction, mostly in the western half of Ohio, west of a north-south line roughly along the eastern border of Franklin County.