Solar power in Illinois
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Solar power in Illinois has been increasing, as the cost of
photovoltaics Photovoltaics (PV) is the conversion of light into electricity using semiconducting materials that exhibit the photovoltaic effect, a phenomenon studied in physics, photochemistry, and electrochemistry. The photovoltaic effect is commercially us ...
has decreased. As of the end of 2020, Illinois had 465 megawatts (MW) of installed photovoltaic and concentrated solar power capacity combined employing over 5,200 jobs.
Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...
adopted a
net metering Net metering (or net energy metering, NEM) is an electricity billing mechanism that allows consumers who generate some or all of their own electricity to use that electricity anytime, instead of when it is generated. This is particularly importa ...
rule which allows customers generating up to 40 kW to use net metering, with the kilowatt hour surplus rolled over each month, and lost at the end of either April or October, as selected by the customer. In 2011, the limit was raised to 2 MW, but is not net metering, as the term is commonly known, as it uses two meters for systems larger than 40 kW. As of 2022, Illinois ranks 17th nationally in cumulative installed solar capacity. There is enough solar energy installed in the state to power 217,000 homes.Illinois Solar
Solar Energy Industries Association. Accessed June 20, 2022


History

The first experimental solar power plant was in 1902, in
Olney, Illinois Olney ( ) is the county seat in Richland County, Illinois. The population was 9,115 at the time of the 2010 census. History Settlement of the Richland County area began around 1815 when Thaddeus Morehouse, a native of Vermont, arrived by wa ...
, by H.E. Willsie and John Boyle, and was based on a design by
Charles Tellier Charles Tellier (29 June 1828 – 19 October 1913) was a French engineer, born in Amiens. He early made a study of motors and compressed air. In 1868, he began experiments in refrigeration, which resulted ultimately in the refrigerating plant, a ...
. In 1904 they set up the Willsie Sun company in St. Louis, and built a 6-horsepower motor. In 2002, Illinois's largest solar array was the 99.4 kW array on the roof of the
Field Museum of Natural History The Field Museum of Natural History (FMNH), also known as The Field Museum, is a natural history museum in Chicago, Illinois, and is one of the largest such museums in the world. The museum is popular for the size and quality of its educational ...
, in Chicago. In 2010 the country's largest urban solar array, 10 MW, was installed in West Pullman, on Chicago's south side. In 2012,
IKEA IKEA (; ) is a Dutch multinational conglomerate based in the Netherlands that designs and sells , kitchen appliances, decoration, home accessories, and various other goods and home services. Started in 1943 by Ingvar Kamprad, IKEA has been t ...
installed solar PV on its two stores in Bolingbrook and Schaumburg totaling almost 2 MW. Also in 2012, the 20 MW Grand Ridge Solar Plant in LaSalle County was completed. The
University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...
built a 5.87 MW solar farm in 2015 which will provide 2% of the university's electricity. In November 2016,
ComEd Commonwealth Edison, commonly known by syllabic abbreviation as ComEd, is the largest electric utility in Illinois, and the in Chicago and much of Northern Illinois. Its service territory stretches roughly from Iroquois County on the south to ...
br>attempted to add additional fees
to the bills of only residential solar users, commonly called demand charges, in the text of a wider energy bill. They were eventually pulled out of the bill, which passed in December 2016 without them.


Statistics


See also

* *
Wind power in Illinois Wind power in Illinois provided nearly 10% of the state's generated electrical power in 2020 powering 1,231,900 homes. At the end of 2020, Illinois had 6,300 megawatts (MW) of wind power installed, ranking fifth among states for installed wind tu ...
*
Solar power in the United States Solar power includes solar farms as well as local distributed generation, mostly on rooftops and increasingly from community solar arrays. In 2021, utility-scale solar power generated 115 terawatt-hours (TWh), or 2.8% of electricity in t ...
*
Renewable energy in the United States According to preliminary data from the US Energy Information Administration, renewable energy accounted for about 12.6% of total primary energy consumption and about 19.8% of the domestically produced electricity in the United States in 202 ...


References


External links

* GA Mansoori, N Enayati, LB Agyarko (2016)
Energy: Sources, Utilization, Legislation, Sustainability, Illinois as Model State
World Sci. Pub. Co.,
Illinois Solar Energy AssociationIncentives and policies
{{Energy in the USA Energy in Illinois
Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...