Pivot Energy broke ground on a 5 MW solar project in Weld County, Colorado built for the University of Colorado, Boulder.
CU Boulder will enter a 20-year subscription to the offsite project, receiving renewable energy credits (REC) associated with the project as credit on its electricity bills. The university is the project’s sole offtaker.
The arrangement is made possible by Colorado’s virtual net metering program established by Colorado Senate Bill 21-261 in 2021.
“We are pleased to be an inaugural subscriber under the innovative policy passed into law in Colorado to expand Colorado’s solar resources and demonstrate continued leadership in the energy transition,” said Chancellor Justin Schwarz.
The solar array will enable CU-Boulder to offset its electricity usage and advance its Scope 2 greenhouse gas emissions goals, 50% reduction by 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. The project is cost neutral for the university, said Pivot Energy.
Pivot Energy will develop, own and operate the project, which is expected to be completed in early 2026. Once active, the project is expected to produce approximately 9.5 million kWh of solar energy annually, equivalent to powering more than 850 homes or removing 1,580 passenger cars from the road for one year. Laid end-to-end, the project’s approximate 8,000 solar panels are enough to fill four football fields, said Pivot Energy.
The agrivoltaic project will also include space for approximately 100 sheep to graze and manage vegetation growth on site. A local rancher will have grazing access for their flock April through October each year.
The partnership between Pivot and CU Boulder was announced in July 2024. Pivot is a U.S.-based Certified B-Corporation and independent power producer that develops, finances, builds, owns, and manages solar and energy storage projects.
Colorado has over 4.5 GW of cumulative solar capacity installed, or enough to power over 900,000 homes, said the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA). Nearly 12% of the state’s electricity is generated by solar and over 8,000 Coloradans are employed in the solar industry, said SEIA.
This content is protected by copyright and may not be reused. If you want to cooperate with us and would like to reuse some of our content, please contact: editors@pv-magazine.com.
By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment.
Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website. Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so.
You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future, in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately. Otherwise, your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled.
Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy.