Federal government to lease 8,000 acres of Hanford nuclear waste site for solar and battery farms

Hecate Energy LLC, a Chicago developer, owner and operator of renewable energy resources, is in negotiations with the U.S. Energy Department to build a utility-scale solar power plant with battery storage on 8,000 acres at the giant Hanford nuclear waste remediation site in eastern Washington state. The agency says the project will provide up to 1 GW of power once it is operational over the next five to seven years.

The department is currently negotiating financial terms for a land lease on the 564-square-mile site, a former U.S. nuclear weapons production center that dates back to World War II, when the first atomic bomb was developed. Once the property agreement is in place, Hecate will lead compliance with environmental reviews required by the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Historic Preservation Act.

The development “is transforming thousands of acres of land at our Hanford site into a thriving, carbon-free solar energy production facility, setting an example for cleaning up our environment and providing new economic opportunities for local communities,” U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm said in a statement.

Hecate, which is 40% owned by Spanish oil giant Repsol, manages more than 20 U.S. clean-energy projects that are currently under construction or in late-stage development, including two 600-MW solar projects under development in Cheyenne County, Colo. It will work with the Bonneville Power Administration to assess the impact of the proposed solar power on the regional grid and determine any necessary infrastructure upgrades, an Energy Department spokesman said in an email.

Hecate has also explored offshore wind development opportunities, partnering with developers EDF Renewables and Ørsted on potential floating wind farm projects off the coast of Portugal and Spain, and expressing interest in developing offshore wind in the Gulf of Mexico.

Federal plans to auction additional Gulf of Mexico lands off the coast of Texas and Louisiana later this year were canceled late last month due to a lack of interest from bidders, but the U.S. Interior Department said it may negotiate with Hecate on its unsolicited lease application.

The company said it has raised more than $2 billion in funding in recent months to develop about 2 GW of renewable energy in the U.S.

For the Energy Dept. solar project, Hecate was selected from a group of 11 proposals in response to the agency’s request for qualifications in March. The DOE notes that it can cancel and rescind the selection for any reason during negotiations.

The Hanford solar project is part of the agency’s Cleanup to Clean Energy initiative, which was launched last year in response to President Joe Biden’s 2021 executive order directing federal agencies to use federal lands to develop renewable energy projects. The department says it has identified about 35,000 acres to accommodate public facilities at the large complex of former federal nuclear weapons sites.

Earlier this year, the company announced similar agreements at the Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls, the Savannah River Site in Aiken, South Carolina, and the Nevada National Security Site in Nye County, Nevada.

The DOE said last month that developer Ameresco of Framingham, Mass., is negotiating to lease land to install 75 MW of solar and storage on more than 500 acres on the Savannah River, while Estuary of Reno, Nev., has been selected to develop a 200 MW solar project on a 2,400-acre site in Nevada; and two companies — NorthRenew Energy Partners of Beckett, Mass., and Spitfire of Oklahoma City — are negotiating at the Idaho National Lab.