Alliant Energy Seeks to Own Iowa’s Largest Solar Power Facility

(Cedar Rapids, IA) — Alliant Energy plans to buy a solar installation in eastern Iowa that’s being developed by a Florida-based company called NextEra Energy. The site of the project is in Linn County, next to the Duane Arnold Nuclear Power Plant that was shut down a year ago and is being decommissioned. Transmission lines at the facility near Palo would be used for what’s being called the Duane Arnold Solar Project. The solar panels would generate an estimated 200 megawatts of power, enough to provide electricity to more than 160-thousand homes. The plan also calls for 75 megawatts of battery storage. Another array of solar panels would be installed later and, according to Alliant, it then would be the state’s largest solar power project.