Douglas County commissioners on Wednesday will consider extending permits for a potential solar farm north of Lawrence while a court injunction blocks progress on the facility’s construction.
Commissioners Patrick Kelly, Karen Willey and Shannon Reid gave unanimous approval to a conditional use permit for the Kansas Sky Energy Center in April 2024 after multiple hourslong meetings filled with divided public comment.
The permits will expire next month if commissioners don’t issue the extension. The commissioners who approved it, now joined by two additional commissioners, Gene Dorsey and Erica Anderson, will consider the extension request Wednesday.
The project, a 159-megawatt solar farm, would be built, owned and operated by Evergy with designs provided by Savion LLC, a division of Royal Dutch Shell based out of Kansas City. The companies plan to use 1,105 acres in Grant Township, north of Lawrence, for the project.
Click here to learn more about our newsletters first
Attorneys representing a group including Grant Township, the North Lawrence Improvement Association and more than a dozen plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against the county in 2024, aiming to block the project.
In December of that year, Douglas County District Judge James McCabria granted an injunction that halted progress of the project while the lawsuit is still pending.
Please support
The Lawrence Times!
Subscribe here.
Per county zoning regulations, the Kansas Sky Energy Center conditional use permit would expire two years after it was first granted since there has been no construction progress. Developers are asking for a one-year extension.
Matthew Gough, an attorney for the proposed facility, filed a request in December 2025 for commissioners to extend the permit for another year. At the time, McCabria had scheduled a bench trial for April 2026 that has since been pushed to November, with a pretrial conference set for September.
“Approval of this request would not result in any detriment to the County, while denial would cause undue harm to the Applicant by effectively terminating the project,” Gough wrote.
Tad and Margaret Kramar from Big Springs, Kansas, submitted written public comment to commissioners also urging them to vote for an extension.
“Denial of the extension would be a devastating blow to our efforts to reduce global warming and climate change, and to renewable energy in Kansas, and would encourage other Kansas counties to follow your lead and reject renewable energy projects,” they wrote.
Many opponents at past commission meetings said they support solar energy and believe it is important, but that the proposed location is not the right place for it.
Commissioners will consider the permit extension request during their meeting starting at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 11 in the commission chamber of the historic courthouse, 1100 Massachusetts St.
See the full meeting agenda at this link. People may give public comment in person or virtually via Zoom; find the Zoom link on this page.
If local news matters to you, please help us keep doing this work.
Click here to learn more about our newsletters first
This post is by the Lawrence Times news team.
If you have news tips, questions, comments, concerns, compliments or corrections for our team, please reach out and let us know what’s on your mind. Email us at Hello@LawrenceKSTimes.com (don’t forget the KS!), or find more contact info and a quick contact form at LawrenceKSTimes.com/contact.
Follow us so you won’t miss the local news that matters most to you:
Starting Tuesday, contractors will close northbound Monterey Way from Bob Billings Drive to West 14th Terrace. Find more on that and other traffic updates around town here.
The 39th annual Lawrence St. Patrick’s Day Parade is set to fill the streets with green-clad good times on Tuesday.
The Lawrence Arts Center has ended its search for a permanent director, naming ceramic artist, longtime staff member and interim executive director Ben Ahlvers to the position.
Bert Nash will not be able to develop a supportive housing project in Lawrence, and the Affordable Housing Advisory Board voted 4-1 Thursday to recommend the city claw back $558,000 in funding.
780 Songwriters Circle on Wednesday provided a space for Lawrence musicians to talk about their songwriting processes and perform for an audience of about 50 people.
MORE …
Proposed constitutional amendment would put abortion back on the Kansas ballot
Q39 barbecue restaurant opens in downtown Lawrence
Never miss a story. Sign up for our emails.
Copyright © 2026 The Lawrence Times.
The Lawrence Times is a Lawrence, Kansas owned and operated publication covering key news and providing important information for the Lawrence and Douglas County, Kansas, community.
We operate without a paywall so that everyone can read our coverage, regardless of ability to pay. Please click here to support us if you are able.
The Times is a proud “aspiring entrepreneur” member of Local Independent Online News (LION) Publishers.
We are happy to consider individual requests to republish content; however, no content from this site may be republished without express permission.
