KCRag Forum

Evergy announces plan for large solar farm near coal plant in Kansas City

Evergy will build a 10-megawatt solar farm near its coal-fired power plant in northeast Kansas City, the company announced on Wednesday.

The electric utility serves 1.6 million customers in Kansas and Missouri. Half of the energy produced at the solar farm will go to serve that entire base. The other half will be reserved for nearly 1,200 customers who participate in the utility’s solar subscription program, which allows users to pay a slightly higher bill to invest in renewable energy.
...
Evergy plans to construct the solar farm near its Hawthorn power plant, which sits next to the Missouri River northeast of downtown Kansas City. The site will consist of 22,000 solar panels and begin operations this fall. Using the existing infrastructure near the coal plant allows Evergy to build “one of the most cost-effective and largest solar subscription facilities in Missouri,” the release says.
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https://missouriindependent.com/2022/01 ... nsas-city/

Location:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Everg ... 4.4792579

Unfortunately, they skipped the part about Hawthorn being a coal-fired plant that they plan to keep in operaiton until 2040...

this is in addition to the proposed largest solar farm in the US by the airport?

dukuboy1 wrote: ↑Wed Jan 05, 2022 6:06 pm this is in addition to the proposed largest solar farm in the US by the airport?

Airport Solar Farm may not even be Evergy

Building solar farms is such a massive waste of energy, materials, and land. Wind has increased its output exponentially over the years to the point that a single tower is now producing (Commonly) 8 or more MW. 15 MW towers are going up. Just a decade ago it was 1.5 MW max, and 750 KW avg. 8MW is the new average. Solar on the other hand.. consumes thousands of acres and thousands of panels for a measly 1 MW. Wow. A total waste. A wind farm operating at just 20% efficiency in the KC area would easily produce 250 MW.

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 2:25 am Building solar farms is such a massive waste of energy, materials, and land. Wind has increased its output exponentially over the years to the point that a single tower is now producing (Commonly) 8 or more MW. 15 MW towers are going up. Just a decade ago it was 1.5 MW max, and 750 KW avg. 8MW is the new average. Solar on the other hand.. consumes thousands of acres and thousands of panels for a measly 1 MW. Wow. A total waste. A wind farm operating at just 20% efficiency in the KC area would easily produce 250 MW.

It isn’t windy everyday…

Anthony_Hugo98 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 8:40 am

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 2:25 am Building solar farms is such a massive waste of energy, materials, and land. Wind has increased its output exponentially over the years to the point that a single tower is now producing (Commonly) 8 or more MW. 15 MW towers are going up. Just a decade ago it was 1.5 MW max, and 750 KW avg. 8MW is the new average. Solar on the other hand.. consumes thousands of acres and thousands of panels for a measly 1 MW. Wow. A total waste. A wind farm operating at just 20% efficiency in the KC area would easily produce 250 MW.

It isn’t windy everyday…

Nor is it sunny.

My point is that with the massive output of wind for a fraction of the overhead and land use, EVEN at a terribly impractical rate of 1 day of production a week.. it would blow these outlandish solar developments being talked about in the KC area out of the water. With just 1-10 wind towers/turbines. It makes zero sense to invest in traditional solar on a municipal or utility level scale.

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 11:08 pm

Anthony_Hugo98 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 8:40 am

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 2:25 am Building solar farms is such a massive waste of energy, materials, and land. Wind has increased its output exponentially over the years to the point that a single tower is now producing (Commonly) 8 or more MW. 15 MW towers are going up. Just a decade ago it was 1.5 MW max, and 750 KW avg. 8MW is the new average. Solar on the other hand.. consumes thousands of acres and thousands of panels for a measly 1 MW. Wow. A total waste. A wind farm operating at just 20% efficiency in the KC area would easily produce 250 MW.

It isn’t windy everyday…

Nor is it sunny.

My point is that with the massive output of wind for a fraction of the overhead and land use, EVEN at a terribly impractical rate of 1 day of production a week.. it would blow these outlandish solar developments being talked about in the KC area out of the water. With just 1-10 wind towers/turbines. It makes zero sense to invest in traditional solar on a municipal or utility level scale.

Wind has more push back in urbanized areas. Your 1,000' 15MW towers are going to take alot of approvals and would absolutely get push back that solar won't.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... RQJ6SW8AbN

Nuclear Energy Institute seems to think solar can produce a lot more power per sq mile than wind (at least in 2015).
https://www.nei.org/news/2015/land-need ... ear-plants

normalthings wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 11:34 pm

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 11:08 pm

Anthony_Hugo98 wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 8:40 am
It isn’t windy everyday…

Nor is it sunny.

My point is that with the massive output of wind for a fraction of the overhead and land use, EVEN at a terribly impractical rate of 1 day of production a week.. it would blow these outlandish solar developments being talked about in the KC area out of the water. With just 1-10 wind towers/turbines. It makes zero sense to invest in traditional solar on a municipal or utility level scale.

Wind has more push back in urbanized areas. Your 1,000' 15MW towers are going to take alot of approvals and would absolutely get push back that solar won't.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... RQJ6SW8AbN

Nuclear Energy Institute seems to think solar can produce a lot more power per sq mile than wind (at least in 2015).
https://www.nei.org/news/2015/land-need ... ear-plants

You'd be surprised what short hub wind turbines are cranking out now. 200' of height (Same height as the Mamba roller coaster at WOF) will get you many MW's of power. That study from 2015 is irrelevant in todays world. Wind turbines are progressing quickly enough that 1-3 years back and that's it. Similar to computing. Wind is doubling capacities every third year. It's advancing far faster than any other renewable. In 2015 1.5 MW was still groundbreaking amount of power. Now that's laughable. Many 3MW towers are already being retired and replaced with 6/8's. I believe we're already hitting close to 20 offshore now too. For ONE tower. In the 90s we were getting a few KW. Like ..10 KW. Wild!

im2kull wrote: ↑Fri Jan 07, 2022 6:56 pm

normalthings wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 11:34 pm

im2kull wrote: ↑Thu Jan 06, 2022 11:08 pm

Nor is it sunny.

My point is that with the massive output of wind for a fraction of the overhead and land use, EVEN at a terribly impractical rate of 1 day of production a week.. it would blow these outlandish solar developments being talked about in the KC area out of the water. With just 1-10 wind towers/turbines. It makes zero sense to invest in traditional solar on a municipal or utility level scale.

Wind has more push back in urbanized areas. Your 1,000' 15MW towers are going to take alot of approvals and would absolutely get push back that solar won't.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q ... RQJ6SW8AbN

Nuclear Energy Institute seems to think solar can produce a lot more power per sq mile than wind (at least in 2015).
https://www.nei.org/news/2015/land-need ... ear-plants

You'd be surprised what short hub wind turbines are cranking out now. 200' of height (Same height as the Mamba roller coaster at WOF) will get you many MW's of power. That study from 2015 is irrelevant in todays world. Wind turbines are progressing quickly enough that 1-3 years back and that's it. Similar to computing. Wind is doubling capacities every third year. It's advancing far faster than any other renewable. In 2015 1.5 MW was still groundbreaking amount of power. Now that's laughable. Many 3MW towers are already being retired and replaced with 6/8's. I believe we're already hitting close to 20 offshore now too. For ONE tower. In the 90s we were getting a few KW. Like ..10 KW. Wild!

So instead of taking up more land you could just replace old turbines with new generators and quadruple the output?

I am not the most familiar with the space but just from what I’m reading these high MW towers are huge, 1,000 feet tall beasts. Even the smaller 200’ is obviously going to be a cause of concern in and around the airport

Grandview also apparently pursuing a solar farm...
https://www.construction.com/projects/d ... solar-farm

agreed wind farms are more efficient than solar. The footprint for a vertical turbine would logically be less than laid out mirrors. But most wind farms cover several acres, especially the big ones you see out in rural areas of KS.

I agree getting a small farm in an urban area is not practical. It would have to be very small and not sure what you can generate. Both worth taking a look.

However I would say there might be some opportunity to create wind farms closer to the KC metro by exploring the vast amount of farm land that is located along the MO River as you head east, especially along HWY 210, east of 291. I mean the city of Liberty extends all the way down to the river in that area. But there is a lot of open farm land, some of it protected by levies, some of it not.

I'm not sure if that is a good "wind producing" area but I would think larger wind farms somewhere in that area with an Eastern boundary of say Richmond area would work well. Plus the infrastructure to connect the Power to powerplants might be easier as Hawthorne & Independence power plants located along the river in this area. Plus almost all the development in the area is industrial & what is not is then farmland.

I'd explore wind out that way if feasible.

Hawthorne solar farm started...
https://www.construction.com/projects/d ... ar-project

Solar windows coming some day?

Scientists create a nearly invisible solar cell with up to 79% transparency
https://interestingengineering.com/scie ... t=14072022