Wind and Solar Energy Leasing in Montgomery County, Illinois

Virden Wind: the first phase of a larger regional project

The Virden Wind Energy Project is the first phase of the Grand Prairie Energy Park, a roughly $450 million, multi-phase wind development being built by UKA Group's North American affiliate across Montgomery, Macoupin, and Sangamon Counties. The Virden-area phase calls for approximately 14 to 17 turbines generating around 100 megawatts, and the Montgomery County Board has approved the project. Turbines proposed for the project are reported at roughly 377 feet at the hub -- taller than the Illinois State Capitol.

A later, larger phase would add another 17 to 23 turbines, mostly in Montgomery County with some spilling into Sangamon County, eventually bringing the full multi-county project to roughly 350 megawatts. Reported annual property-tax revenue from just the first phase was projected at more than $1.05 million across Montgomery and Sangamon Counties combined, over more than 30 years -- money that flows to schools, health care, and infrastructure rather than directly to nearby landowners who aren't hosting a turbine.

A solar farm built on a cleaned-up Superfund site

Montgomery County's most distinctive solar story involves land that spent nearly a century as an industrial hazard before becoming a power source. The 33-acre site near Hillsboro produced leaded-zinc oxide from 1911 to 2003, generating more than 40,000 cubic yards of hazardous waste improperly disposed of on the property -- serious enough contamination that it became a formal EPA Superfund site. Remedial action was completed in 2015, with the EPA reviewing conditions every five years since.

Standard Solar's AC IL Hillsboro Solar Project now occupies that remediated ground: a 6.9-megawatt (DC) array with more than 11,500 solar modules on single-axis trackers, producing roughly 11,550 megawatt-hours a year -- enough for about 1,250 U.S. homes -- and displacing an estimated 9,985 metric tons of CO2 annually. It's a useful example for anyone assessing land near a former industrial site in the county: a documented remediation history doesn't just clear the way for redevelopment, it can make a site specifically attractive for solar, since brownfield land often has fewer competing agricultural uses.

Several more solar applications on file with the county

The Hillsboro project isn't the only solar activity in Montgomery County. The county has processed multiple additional solar farm development permit applications in recent years, including Montgomery IL Solar 1, Montgomery Springs Solar (on parcels in Taylor Springs), North Sun, and Oil Sun -- all reviewed under the county's own Wind and Solar Energy Ordinance, revised in August 2024. Each has its own project-specific status, acreage, and timeline; if you're evaluating land near one of these named projects, confirm current approval status directly with the county rather than assuming an application that surfaces in a search means a project is built or even approved.

What a Montgomery County lease offer or nearby-land purchase should check

Illinois counties can't write wind or solar siting rules stricter than the statewide standard set by Public Act 102-1123 (55 ILCS 5/5-12020), effective January 27, 2023, which covers setbacks, turbine height, vegetative screening, shadow flicker, sound, decommissioning, and agricultural-land considerations, and which bars counties from imposing outright moratoriums. Montgomery County's own Wind and Solar Energy Ordinance (revised August 2024) sits on top of that statewide floor -- confirm the county's current, specific provisions directly given how much development is already approved or pending here.

If you've received a wind or solar lease offer, have an attorney review the decommissioning and land-restoration terms specifically, since those determine what happens to the parcel decades from now. If you're buying land near an existing or proposed project instead, ask the Montgomery County Clerk & Recorder whether a wind or solar lease easement is already recorded against the parcel or an adjoining one, and separately confirm whether the county's building-notification requirement (a distinct filing handled by the Supervisor of Assessments, apart from zoning) applies to any structure you plan to build.