Solar power in Kentucky

Solar roof, National Guard training facility, Artemus

Solar power in Kentucky has been growing in recent years due to new technological improvements and a variety of regulatory actions and financial incentives, particularly a 30% federal tax credit, available through 2016, for any size project. Kentucky could generate 10% of all of the electricity used in the United States from land cleared from coal mining in the state. Covering just one-fifth with photovoltaics would supply all of the state's electricity.[1]

The Berea Solar Farm is a community solar farm, which opened with 60 235-watt solar panels (14.1 kW).[2] All of the available panels sold out in four days.[3]

A 2 MW single axis tracking solar farm began operation in 2011 in Bowling Green.[4][5] As of 2011, the largest system on any farm in the state was the 100.32 kW array completed on November 1, 2011, in Fancy Farms.[6] The first hospital in the state to use solar power is Rockcastle Regional Hospital in Mt. Vernon, which installed a 60.9 kW array on the roof in November, 2011.[7]

In 2015, Fort Campbell installed a 1.9MW solar farm that provides 10% of the electricity used by the base.[8]

Kentucky's only maker of solar panels is Alternative Energy Kentucky.[9]

  1. ^ "Guest Post: Can Coal Mines Become Solar Farms?". www.greentechmedia.com.
  2. ^ "Berea Solar Farm News".
  3. ^ Berea (KY) Solar Farm Sells Out
  4. ^ Solar installations in Kentucky Archived 2012-05-28 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ^ "Bowling Green To Have $6M, 10-Acre Solar Farm". Archived from the original on May 27, 2012.
  6. ^ "Willet Farm's Press Release".
  7. ^ "Kentucky's First Solar-Powered Hospital".
  8. ^ Fort Campbell solar array completed, ClarksvilleNow, September 21, 2015
  9. ^ Company says the future of solar panels in Ky. is bright