A ribbon-cutting ceremony this week celebrated the completion of what officials are calling the largest solar energy project in Milwaukee's history — a 4.6-megawatt expansion built atop a former city landfill just southeast of Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport. The addition triples the site's total output to 6.85 megawatts, and stickers will soon go up on the doors of fire stations, libraries, police stations and other city buildings now running on renewable power.
The expansion is part of We Energies' state-approved Renewable Pathway program, according to CBS 58, which first reported on the completed project. Under the arrangement, We Energies finances construction, maintenance and the land lease, while the city pays a premium of an additional half-cent per kilowatt-hour for the electricity it draws. Erick Shambarger said the cost of inaction on climate change and renewable energy is substantially greater than the city's payments under the deal, per the station's report.
The 44-acre site at 1600 E. College Ave. was long considered off-limits to conventional development because its clay cap prevented drilling into the ground, according to Urban Milwaukee. The site's development complications left it unusable for other development, while solar racks could be installed without being drilled into the ground, turning an idle municipal liability into a clean-energy asset.
Costs, Rebates and the Fine Print
Urban Milwaukee's reporting puts the net annual cost to Milwaukee taxpayers at roughly $84,000, a figure that accounts for the half-cent-per-kilowatt-hour premium offset by land lease payments of about $800 per acre that We Energies pays the city. The first phase of the project generated 2.25 megawatts before this latest build-out pushed the farm's total capacity to 6.85 megawatts across 9,700 solar panels, tripling the original footprint.
A 2020 municipal energy benchmark cited by the same outlet found Milwaukee spends about $13.5 million annually on energy citywide, including $4 million on building power and gas, $3.5 million on streetlights, and $6 million for Milwaukee Water Works — a reminder that the solar farm's savings represent a modest slice of a much larger municipal energy budget.
Workforce Rules and Airport-Adjacent Security
Contractors Westphal & Co. and SunVest Solar were required under the project agreements to ensure unemployed or underemployed Milwaukee residents performed at least 20% of total construction hours, per Urban Milwaukee's account of the deal's labor terms. The project also supports the Wisconsin Air National Guard's 128th Air Refueling Wing, according to the Federal Highway Administration.
The landfill array now supplies power alongside a 6-megawatt We Energies solar project in Caledonia commissioned in September 2025, bringing Milwaukee's total dedicated municipal solar capacity under utility pathway agreements to 9.6 megawatts, the City of Milwaukee Environmental Collaboration Office reports. Together, the two projects now supply 100% renewable power to 80 city buildings, according to CBS 58's reporting on the milestone.
A Long Road to a 17-Year-Old Goal
The project also contributes to the Environmental Collaboration Office's goal of cutting greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2030, per CBS 58. That target traces back to a Common Council resolution in 2009 that set a goal of generating 25% of municipal electricity needs from renewable sources by 2025, according to the Environmental Collaboration Office.
The Common Council built on that groundwork in June 2023 when it adopted its Climate and Equity Plan, establishing binding targets to cut community greenhouse gas emissions 45% by 2035 and reach net-zero emissions by 2050, while pushing for green jobs paying at least $40,000 annually, WUWM reported at the time. The following month, the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin approved We Energies' Renewable Pathway pilot program, the regulatory mechanism that let commercial and public institutions like Milwaukee subscribe to dedicated in-state renewable generation under fixed short-term contracts.
A Complicated Relationship With We Energies
The solar milestone lands amid a tenser backdrop between City Hall and its utility partner. The Milwaukee Common Council voted unanimously in May to intervene against We Energies' proposed 2027 and 2028 electric rate increases before state regulators, as Hoodline reported in Milwaukee Council Goes to War With We Energies. City leaders have also weighed more fundamental changes to their relationship with the utility, a debate detailed in Hoodline's earlier coverage of council members mulling whether to move away from We Energies entirely.
The dynamic underscores a dual reality in Milwaukee's clean-energy transition: the city and its utility maintain a productive technical partnership that has delivered 9.6 megawatts of municipal solar capacity and workforce equity mandates, even as city officials simultaneously fight the same utility over rate hikes they say burden residents. Milwaukee works through state-approved tariffs like the Renewable Pathway program to participate in the projects.
