Mississippi Commission Gives Approval for 100 MW/ 1000 Acre Solar Farm

The Mississippi Delta will soon be home to the largest utility-owned solar farm in the state, after receiving approval from the Mississippi Public Service Commission.

The Mississippi Delta will soon be home to the largest utility-owned solar farm in the state, after receiving approval from the Mississippi Public Service Commission. Recurrent Energy, a solar facility manufacturer and subsidiary of Canadian Solar will build the project on behalf of Entergy Mississippi, LLC.

The project should be complete by no later than mid-2022. Once built, Entergy will assume ownership for the life of the facility. The emissions-free, renewable energy plant will sit on approximately 1,000 acres in Sunflower County and will connect to Entergy’s transmission grid in Ruleville.

Recurrent Energy has received unanimous approval from the Mississippi Public Service Commission on the build-transfer agreement (BTA) with Entergy Mississippi. The BTA has a base purchase price of approximately USD 138.4 million on the 100-megawatt Sunflower solar photovoltaic project.

“We’re happy to have commission approval to move forward,” said Haley Fisackerly, Entergy Mississippi president and CEO. “The Sunflower Solar Facility will be key in helping us meet changing customer expectations. It will give us more sustainable ways to meet our customers’ energy needs while diversifying our fuel supply.”

The project will be a single-axis tracking photovoltaic power generator. Its 350,000 PV modules will be able to generate 100 MW of clean energy, enough to power more than 16,000 homes.

In 2016, Entergy Mississippi began studying solar as a renewable energy source. That year, the company built the state’s first-ever utility-owned solar project. The pilot project consisted of three sites in Brookhaven, Hinds, and DeSoto counties. These sites helped answer questions about how solar would perform in Mississippi’s varied geographical regions. The project was the genesis for the Sunflower Solar facility.

Entergy Mississippi, LLC provides electricity to approximately 450,000 customers in 45 counties. The firm owns and operates power plants with approximately 30,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity, including nearly 9,000 megawatts of nuclear power delivering electricity to 2.9 million utility customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas.