PEORIA (25News Now) -As electricity demand continues to rise, Ameren Illinois and ELM MicroGrid said they have completed a $20 million solar energy project in Peoria featuring nearly 5,000 solar panels and battery storage technology.
The newly energized Peoria Solar Energy Center, located on the city’s northwest side, spans 37-acres along Prichard Road. It is the third renewable energy generation facility developed by Ameren Illinois under provisions of the Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA), which Illinois enacted in 2021.
Kristol Simms, Ameren Illinois’ vice president of clean energy transition, economic, community and business development, said the company is committed to supporting the state’s clean energy transition.
CEJA established goals for Illinois to transition to 100% clean energy by 2050, including a goal of generating 50% of the state’s electricity from renewable sources by 2040.
“We do have sustainability goals. We know that overtime as a society we will start moving toward decarbonized way that we operate, right? So, clean energy is going to be the foundation to how we get there. Cleaner power that is produced to power things like our homes, run the businesses in Illinois,” said Simms.
Illinois has a deregulated electricity market, meaning utility companies such as Ameren Illinois primarily deliver electricity rather than generate it or determine the cost of the electricity supply. However, the company remains responsible for maintaining its distribution infrastructure and delivering reliable electricity to customers.
The Peoria facility has a solar generation capacity of 2.5 MW, which project officials estimate is enough to power approximately 300 to 400 homes.
Electricity generated at the facility will feed into Ameren Illinois’ distribution system, which is connected to the broader regional power grid operated by the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO).
One of the facility’s distinguishing features is its battery storage system, which allows electricity generated by the solar panels to be stored and delivered to the grid when needed.
Aron Bowman, president of Peoria-based ELM MicroGrid, said the company’s local roots played a role in its partnership with Ameren Illinois.
“What the batteries do, is through intelligent controls that we have integrated in through our ELM field site system, those work with the Ameren engineers to identify how much power is being generated by the solar panels, and whether Ameren needs that power right at that moment back on the grid or if they want to store the energy in the batteries and use it at a later time,” Bowman said.
The battery storage system has a power capacity of 1.5 MW and approximately 4 MW-hours of energy storage, according to Bowman, depending on the rate at which the stored energy is discharged.
That flexibility allows Ameren Illinois to store electricity during periods of high solar production and release it when demand increases, including during evening hours when customers return home.
“The sun might be shining in the middle of the day when people are at work, and this area has a lot of homes in it. So, the energy is really needed at night when people are home from work and turn on their lights, turn on their electric dryer, their oven, that sort of thing. So, Ameren has the ability through the battery to bring the power to the grid when their customers need it the most,” Bowman said.
The $20 million project also created more than 50 construction jobs, according to Ameren Illinois.
Project officials said the solar panels have an expected lifespan of 30 years, while the battery storage units are expected to last approximately 20 years.
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