Is community solar right for you?

How to harness the power of the sun

If you’ve ever seriously considered installing your own solar energy system, you probably know all the environmental and economic reasons to do it.

On the other hand, there are plenty of reasons it might not be a good fit to have solar panels on your own roof. It might be impractical because of the direction or angle of your roof, or due to shade. Perhaps you’re offput by the idea of maintenance or the potential damage it could do to your property.

Wouldn’t it be great if you could reap the benefits of solar energy without installing your own system?

With the Alliant Energy® Community Solar program, our customers can.

How to harness the power of community

The way community solar works is, we build, operate and maintain a utility-scale solar garden. Customers subscribe to blocks of the garden, enough to cover up to 100% of their annual usage if they want to, or a smaller amount.

Subscribers share the costs associated with the project, included in the upfront subscription. This makes community solar, dollar for dollar, one of the most cost-effective ways to invest in solar energy.

Once operational, subscribers get bill credits based on the garden’s production every month for the 20-year life of the project.

Fond du Lac and beyond

At our first community solar garden in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, generated 1.65 million kilowatt-hours of electricity in its first year. The average residential customer subscribed to eight solar blocks and is expected to receive $217 in annual bill credits. We estimate these subscribers will receive a total of about $4,140 in credits over the 20-year life of the project.

Our next project, Community Solar – Cedar Rapids in Iowa is fully subscribed; we expect it to be operational in early 2024.

Our next Wisconsin project, Community Solar – Janesville is already 36% subscribed and we haven’t even broken ground yet. We expect to begin construction in the spring and the garden should be operational by the end of 2024.

If you’re a Wisconsin customer, visit our community solar calculator to figure out how many blocks you’d need, what the upfront cost would be and whether community solar is a viable option for you.

If you’re an Iowa customer, you can still check out the calculator to get an idea. We hope to have more community solar gardens in both states and more opportunities to subscribe in the future.

If you’re so excited you can’t wait, we do have a wait list. You can also purchase blocks on behalf of friends, family members and nonprofit organizations in our service area. Visit alliantenergy.com/communitysolar to hear stories from current subscribers and learn more.