Eldorado community leaders join Yuri Horwitz, CEO of Sol Systems, to cut the ribbon on the 342 MW Eldorado Solar Project in Saline County, IL.
Sol Systems has announced completion of the company’s largest project to date — the 342-MWDC Eldorado Solar project in southeast Illinois — built in partnership with Nextracker and SOLV Energy.
The operation of this project also launches long-term partnerships with the American Farmland Trust (AFT) to pair utility-scale solar with row-crop agriculture (Kernza), developed by Kansas-based non-profit The Land Institute, and a long-term community benefits program with funding commitments made to Eldorado High School, Food Works of Southern Illinois and several other local community organizations that advance Sol’s mission to bring economic and environmental benefits to the communities within which it works.
“Developing energy infrastructure with impact is our north star,” said Yuri Horwitz, CEO of Sol Systems. “Eldorado shows what that vision looks like in practice: delivering reliable clean power, forging durable community partnerships, and now proving that agrivoltaics can move from concept to crops. From Day 1, Nextracker and SOLV leaned in to help us make this innovation real. Together, we’re building a replicable model for how utility-scale solar, agriculture and education don’t just coexist — they thrive side by side.”
CEO of Nextracker, Dan Shugar, signs a Nextracker tracker display at the ribbon cutting of the Eldorado Solar Project in Saline County, Illinois.
The partnership with AFT creates a research-driven agrivoltaics program that will plant Kernza, a perennial grain, beneath a portion of the solar project — among the first efforts to pursue row-crop agrivoltaics at this scale in the United States. The funding commitments to local community organizations build on previous community impact programs established through the Power Purchase and Community Investment Agreement, first established in 2020 between Sol Systems and Microsoft.
Nextracker’s high-performance tracking systems and SOLV’s construction expertise will underpin long-term reliability and field adaptability for agronomic trials. Building on findings from Sol Systems’ prior collaborations with the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and AFT, the agrivoltaics program in Eldorado is designed to:
- Establish pollinator habitat at scale to support biodiversity and crop productivity;
- Improve soil health with native and perennial plantings and adaptive management; and
- Test row-crop performance under panels, beginning with Kernza planting in Fall 2025.
News item from about Sol Systems
