Ameren received state approval Thursday to advance its plans to build, own, and operate three wind farms in Missouri — securing the green light for proposals the electric utility announced last year.
The St. Louis-based company initially proposed the trio of Missouri projects last June, along with a fourth solar project that would be in Cass County, Illinois.
The Missouri solar installations will be located in Warren County, Bowling Green and Vandalia, and were formally approved 5-0 by state utility regulators at the Public Service Commission during their weekly meeting Thursday.
Conditions accompanied the PSC’s approval, including one in which Ameren agreed to assess the use of “grazing animals” in and around the solar farms to reduce operation and maintenance expenses. Other terms could allow the company to eventually acquire the fourth project it had originally proposed, in Illinois.
An order from the PSC states that approval for that project should not be granted until “subscriptions” equal to all of its renewable energy output are sold to businesses, like the utility has done in the past. In 2022, for instance, Ameren said it received almost twice as much demand from commercial customers as a separate 150-megawatt solar farm could serve.
“I will be interested to see how long it takes,” said PSC Commissioner Jason Holsman, during his vote Thursday.
The three solar farms approved Thursday will have a combined capacity of 400 megawatts — enough to power up to 73,000 homes, according to Ameren.
If the other, 150-megawatt solar installation proposed in Illinois is also approved and built, the four solar projects would have a total capacity of 550 megawatts — just over half of that of Ameren’s smallest coal-fired power plant.
The majority of the utility’s generation still comes from coal, despite cost and climate concerns that surround the fuel source. Ameren plans, however, to invest billions in renewable energy projects this decade and next, while aiming to become carbon neutral by 2045.
The utility has also recently announced plans to build two natural gas-fired power plants in the next decade — a goal that has generated some outside skepticism about costs and how it fits with the company’s aim to slash greenhouse gas emissions.
The gas-powered plant would be called the Castle Bluff Energy Center, and sit at the confluence of the Meramec and Mississippi rivers, next to where the former Meramec Energy Center burned coal for decades.
