Construction has started on a large $334 million wind farm in northwest Kansas near the city of Colby that sits along Interstate 70.
ENGIE North America Inc. is building the Solomon Forks Wind Project in Thomas County and it will have a total capacity of 276 megawatts.
Solomon Forks is part of the Infinity Renewables portfolio recently acquired by a subsidiary of ENGIE North America from Infinity Renewables and MAP Energy.
The Solomon Forks Wind farm is expected to come online in early summer of 2019. Energy from the project will be sold to T-Mobile US, Inc. and Target Corp. It will consist of 105 turbines with 120-meter diameter rotors.
The $334 million project will include donations to the Colby Unified School District No. 315 and a scholarship fund established by Solomon Forks with Colby Community College.
“We are excited to break ground on a second major project after completing the sale of our development portfolio to ENGIE just this past February,” said Matt Riley, Senior Vice President and Head of U.S. Wind Development at ENGIE North America and former CEO of Infinity Renewables. “Solomon Forks is a testament to the benefits of wind energy for customers and local communities, and we expect to have even more success expanding the use of wind energy in the United States in the coming years.”
ENGINE is considered to be the largest independent power producer and energy efficiency services provider in the world. It has operations in 70 countries and employs 150,000 workers including 1,000 researchers at 11 R and D centers.