The New York Power Authority announced Monday it will hold 51% ownership of a 240-megawatt solar facility in St. Lawrence County, with EDF Power Solutions North America serving as minority partner and construction manager. The Rich Road Solar project marks NYPA's biggest solar agreement since state lawmakers assigned the authority responsibility for creating and owning renewable energy facilities through the 2023-24 state budget. Construction is slated to start in late 2027, with the facility expected to go live in 2030.
The project will deliver $1.2 million in electricity benefit payments to the host community during its first decade of operation, according to NYPA. The authority also pledged $300,000 in yearly contributions to the Renewable Energy Access and Community Help program after operations begin, which supplies bill credits to low-income households. Rich Road's 20-year Tier-1 renewable energy certificates contract came through the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority's 2025 Renewable Energy Standard Request for Proposals. Before the 2023-24 budget shift, NYPA mainly owned hydroelectric resources and supplied electricity to municipal utilities and rural cooperatives across the state.
President and CEO Justin Driscoll said the authority has "built the business structures, assembled a team of seasoned professionals, and refined the project pipeline" needed to push large-scale renewable development statewide despite industry challenges. He called Rich Road the first NYPA project to "leverage a public-private partnership model and secure expiring federal tax credits," adding that it shows "a successful model" for speeding up clean energy projects. EDF Power Solutions North America CEO Tristan Grimbert said the majority ownership proves "how public-private partnership can deliver competitive clean energy at scale," noting the project "has been a long time in the making."
Critics questioned the project's financial viability, pointing to NYPA's own 2025 renewables plan. The New York Energy Alliance noted that NYPA's December board-approved update pegged new solar costs around $100 per megawatt-hour while developers could expect to recoup just $50 per megawatt-hour. The plan stated that new renewable projects can't cover costs by selling output into the New York Independent System Operator market alone. The alliance called Rich Road "a canary in the coal mine," claiming 20 of the 29 private partnerships in NYPA's renewables plan are projects whose earlier state agreements had already collapsed. The authority's updated plan now includes roughly 5.5 gigawatts of planned capacity—up about 2.5 gigawatts from before—spanning solar, wind, and storage projects statewide.