A massive array of ground-mounted solar panels may soon rise on 1,400 acres of largely undevelopable land near Florida Polytechnic University.
The City Commission voted unanimously Monday to allow the solar power generation facility as a conditional use on 2,044 acres of marshy land — east of State Road 33 and North Combee Road and south of University Boulevard.
The land is part of a nearly 5,000-acre tract that the Williams Acquisition Holding Co. LLC has owned for more than two decades.
Williams, based in Oklahoma, is one of the largest natural gas providers in the U.S. and has major land holdings across the Eastern Seaboard, the Gulf of Mexico, the Rockies and the Pacific Northwest. The company has also invested heavily in new energy ventures including large-scale solar installations.
Much of the property proposed for the solar farm was formerly used for phosphate mining. Because it has poor soil that is not suitable for development, it was zoned for conservation or limited development when it was annexed into the city limits in 2001.
The 200 megawatt solar farm will have dozens of racks of 90 solar panels each that are roughly 153 feet long, 13 feet wide and 15 feet tall. They will rotate 60 degrees from east to west to track the movement of the sun.