Westlands Solar Park (WSP) is California’s premier public-private master planned renewable energy infrastructure complex, and is trailblazing for California and the Central Valley, with master planned solar generation and infrastructure similar to the successful Tehachapi wind energy infrastructure.

The entire site of the WSP energy infrastructure complex is located within the Westlands Water District on “brownfield” agricultural land that has already been retired from full agricultural use or is part of the areas planned for land retirement. The retirement and conversion of the lands are supported by the environmental and agricultural community including active support from NRDC, Sierra Club, Defenders of Wildlife and the CA Farm Bureau. WSP will also free up additional water resources for the Central Valley as solar generation utilizes less water than agricultural production.

WSP’s phased development plan allows for partnership or independent development of the solar facilities, energy storage and transmission projects based on market demand over time. Once completed, the currently planned 2.7GW of solar generation from the Westlands Solar Park can power more than 750,000 homes and offsets more than 3.2 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) from the atmosphere each year, while creating more than 800 jobs at the peak of construction.

The Westlands Solar Park study area comprises approximately 20,000 acres of agriculturally disturbed land intended for renewable development, and is located in the Westlands Water District primarily in Kings County.
Westlands Solar Park has been identified in the state’s Renewable Energy Transmission Initiative (RETI) as ideal for solar power generation in excess of 5 GWs. The RETI created Westlands Solar Park as a competitive renewable energy zone and is regularly included in the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) renewable energy portfolio planning scenarios that influence the long-term procurement plans for utility agencies and the California Independent System Operator’s (CAISO) annual transmission planning process.

The initial pilot project reached commercial operation in 2016, and other Phase 1 projects are expected to begin operation in between 2019 and 2021. Mid- to later-term projects are planned for 2023 to 2024 operations.

The Westlands Solar Park team and its affiliates have wide-ranging experience in the California power business and collectively have helped to deliver approximately 2,000 MWs of power generation projects to the market.

Westside Holdings, LLC and its joint venture partner, CIM Group, LLC lead the infrastructure & energy development for Westlands Solar Park (WSP). The team has deep capabilities including: real estate and land development, private equity investing, and political, regulatory, and utility experience in California energy.

Since 2009, the vision of Westlands Solar Park is to change the conversation about developing renewable energy in California. The partnership believes that developing in-state renewables in this master planned approach benefits the state’s ambitious renewable goals, and is important to California’s local economies by:

1. maintaining jobs locally, and
2. helping to keep the “all in” cost of power to rate-payers low. Developing carbon-free generation, storage and associated transmission in a coordinated manner can enable greater utilization of the combined investments and thereby ultimately lower end-user costs for rate-payers.

Westlands Solar Park has the necessary infrastructure and transmission for the first phases of the park. Future phases may require new transmission upgrades to achieve full buildout. Energy from the park can be balanced with other state resources such as Tehachapi wind power, and the Central Valley hydropower to maximize the efficiency and cost of California’s renewable portfolio standard implementation. New generation from the Central Valley will provide geographic diversity to the state’s renewable energy supply and will compliment early solar projects concentrated in the California desert regions.

With early and strong support from the environmental and agricultural communities, Westlands Solar Park has gained tremendous support for fulfilling a long-term vision and “least regret” development status for renewable development. Westlands Solar Park appropriately and responsibly balances the needs of agricultural, water, and renewable power.

Westlands Solar Park is a California project, owned by California companies.

The Westlands Solar Park team aims to help utilities meet their renewable portfolio standards (RPS) and greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction goals by working within our solar park directly or facilitating agreements with our phases of renewable energy projects already in process of various sizes.

Our team and strategic partners have developed plans for investor-owned utilities and publicly-owned utilities to achieve RPS goals for 2020 and secure further options beyond 2020 as the cost of solar power is now competitive with other traditional power resources.

Our long-term planning and perspective provides greater certainty and optionality for utilities that need to meet short and long term goals, and plan their large investments in the state by minimizing their “all in” expenses of implementing renewables so that it is cost effective for their rate-payers.

The WSP long term planning efforts and commitment to CA’s renewable and infrastructure needs allows utilities to meet short, middle and long term goals with greater risk mitigation, options for staging phases over time, and hedges against portfolios heavily concentrated in natural gas and other fossil fuels with variable long term pricing, or renewable portfolios that are heavily concentrated in other locations.

Investor Owned Utility Projects:

Current development projects and commercial partnerships are focused on large scale photovoltaic generation systems greater than 20MWs in size for each phase. Please note that our contracts and project details are confidential.  For more detailed information utilities, should contact our team. We also will participate in select RFOs/RFPs.

Publicly Owned Utility Projects:

Our development projects can be customized for each utility’s power needs and combines the economies of scale of these needs with those of other publicly-owned utility, which help to keep costs competitive. Our development partners have experience in building and financing billions of dollars of renewable energy projects in California and throughout the world. For more detailed information on how the WSP can serve your utility please contact our team (utilities and state agencies only please) include contact information.

CCA and C&I Customers:

Our development projects can be customized for your energy and REC needs and we combine the economies of scale of these needs with those of other utilities that we serve to ensure competitive pricing for your organization. Please contact us for more information.

The Westlands Solar Park located in the Central Valley of California, and its location provides the ability to deliver power throughout California.

Regional utilities located on the west coast are also encouraged to contact us to access competitive renewable solar power and plan for middle to long-term opportunities for seasonal power exchanges.

Commercial and Industrial Partnerships

Besides utility agencies, Westlands Solar Park works with commercial and industrial customers to meet their carbon reduction goals with renewable energy and other services.

Westlands Solar Park can work with you to provide flexible and cost effective solar power generated from the most environmentally-supported renewable energy zone in California.

For more information on C&I opportunities please contact Chris Collins at chris@westlandssolarpark.com.

Solar Partners

Development is underway for the next phases of the Westlands Solar Park that and we anticipate these phases to come online at various times between 2019-2024. Future development & construction partners are essential to the success of WSP’s long term potential, and experienced solar developers, independent power producers, energy storage companies, and infrastructure-related energy companies are encouraged to contact us to explore partnerships in particular phases of the solar park.

Westlands Solar Park team has development capabilities to fully develop, construct and operate the energy facilities or partner with other qualified firms that can bring value to our project and utility partners over time.

We are actively seeking energy storage companies looking to partner with solar development projects for strategic locations.

Please no inquiries for professional services, EPC work, sale of components, or sale of panels or other technology elements. Our procurement of equipment and technology is done through qualified firms already identified, and we will post information for any RFPs on the project news section of this website. If no information is posted we are not in the RFP process for procurement of equipment and technology, and therefore may not respond to any requests for such inquiries.

For Utilities interested in mid- and long-term RPS goals and future procurement goals, please contact Chris Collins at chris@westlandssolarpark.com.

For commercial solar companies and solar development businesses interested in learning more about future phases of Westlands Solar Park, please contact our commercial department at (admin@westlandssolarpark.com) and a member of our team will respond to you within 3 business days, depending on the nature of your inquiry.

For media inquiries please contact Danielle Griffen at (559) 222-1322 or danielle@cohencommunications.com

For investment, commercial partnerships, and related inquiries, please contact Josh at josh@westlandssolarpark.com

For regulatory or community outreach matters please contact Dan at dan@westlandssolarpark.com

For inquiries related to permitting and environmental compliance, please search the relevant public agency’s website for updated documentation, or the news/media section of this website for more information. You can also email us at admin@westlandssolarpark.com.

For general inquiries please contact us by emailing:
admin@westlandssolarpark.com

Mailing Address:
Westlands Solar Park
C/O Westside Holdings, LLC
4125 W. Noble Ave., Suite 310
Visalia, CA 93277