Nine months after Danville city council members approved zoning changes so that Aqua Illinois could build a solar farm north of its water treatment plant on Fairchild Street, work has finally started on the project.
Andy Price, the area manager for Aqua Illinois, says construction materials have been delivered to the site, and construction workers have begun preparing the site for the actual construction work to begin. Currently, workers are chopping down trees and brush in the wooded area where the solar panels will be built. He also says about two-thirds of the solar panels have been delivered to the site, and are currently being stored in boxes until they can be assembled.
Price says that although several months have passed since the project was approved, it has not sat idle. He says there have been many pre-construction items that have had to be worked out, including legal matters.
Aqua is partnering with Sol Systems on the solar farm project. It will be built on land north of Aqua’s plant at the west end of Fairchild Street. The companies first proposed the project in 2019, but it failed to gain support from the city, but an amended proposal passed in March.
The solar farm will have a 200-foot setback from residential properties, have 10 feet of shrubs and a 10-foot-tall fence. Price says it should be up and running by April, and will save the company $100,000 a year or about $4 million over the next 25 years.
