Pittsburgh Water is planning its first solar energy project at its water treatment plant, a $1.24 million installation designed to generate clean power on-site and cushion customers against rising electricity costs. The project calls for solar panels across two buildings at the utility's treatment facility, with construction potentially beginning in summer 2027.
The plant sits along Freeport Road in Aspinwall, where Pittsburgh Water draws raw water from the Allegheny River and treats drinking water for more than 80,000 customers across the city, according to the American Galvanizers Association. As reported by WPXI, the solar panels are projected to generate 607,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity annually, roughly equivalent to the yearly power consumption of 55 homes. The largest installation will go on the filtration building and is expected to supply about 9% of the electricity used there.
A Direct Response to Soaring Electric Rates
The timing is no accident. Duquesne Light Company, the electric utility serving the plant, raised its default electricity supply rates by more than 14% in June 2025, according to WPXI's earlier reporting, driving up operating overhead for local municipal infrastructure across western Pennsylvania. Those costs have already rippled into Pittsburgh Water's finances: in a June 2025 state rate filing, Chief Executive Officer Will Pickering cited rising Duquesne Light electricity prices as a key driver behind the utility's request for multi-year customer rate increases covering 2026 and 2027, the station's report notes.
Pickering said the solar project will reduce environmental impact while helping manage those rising electricity costs. Generating some clean energy, he said, is “a practical investment in a sustainable and affordable water system for customers,” per the same account.
Financing Through Federal and State Programs
To make the numbers work, Pittsburgh Water plans to pursue low-interest financing through Pennvest, the state infrastructure bank, along with a 30% federal tax credit. That credit is made available through the Elective Pay, or Direct Pay, mechanism established under Section 6417 of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which allows tax-exempt public entities to receive direct cash refunds from the Internal Revenue Service for clean energy investments — a benefit local government agencies could not claim before 2022. Pennvest itself relies on expanded funding allocations from the 2021 federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to finance municipal drinking water and energy efficiency projects, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
With those combined savings, the project could pay for itself in about 10 years and yield an estimated $1.57 million in total savings over its operational lifespan, the article notes. Still, the financial picture is not without tension: Pittsburgh Water has simultaneously sought multi-year customer rate increases to fund debt service on a far larger capital improvement program, even as this solar project promises long-term savings of its own.
Part of a Longer Clean Energy Push
This is not Pittsburgh Water's first move toward renewables. The utility began evaluating solar feasibility back in August 2023, when it joined 11 other Allegheny County municipalities in the Pennsylvania Solar Center's G.E.T. Solar CONNECT initiative, a regional effort that assessed roughly 7 megawatts of potential solar capacity across 37 municipal facilities, according to the PA Environment Digest Blog. Two months later, in October 2023, the utility also partnered with the City of Pittsburgh and the Western Pennsylvania Energy Consortium on a long-term agreement to procure wind electricity for water production operations, the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority said, a hedge against volatile commercial electric prices that now runs alongside the on-site solar plan.
The solar array also fits within Pittsburgh's Climate Action Plan 3.0, which targets powering 100% of municipal facilities with clean energy by 2030 and cutting citywide emissions by 50%, according to the City of Pittsburgh. Energy consumption accounts for nearly 80% of the city's total greenhouse gas footprint, underscoring why municipal facilities like the Aspinwall plant are a focus of the effort.
One Piece of a Much Bigger Overhaul
The solar installation is arriving alongside a much larger undertaking at the same site. Pittsburgh Water's multi-hundred-million-dollar Water Reliability Plan includes replacing pump stations and constructing a $67 million Clearwell bypass at the Aspinwall facility, according to the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority, making the solar panels one relatively small piece of a sweeping modernization of the treatment campus.
Pittsburgh Water isn't alone among the region's public-service institutions in turning to solar as a hedge against utility disruptions. Hoodline reported in August that North Side Christian Health Center installed Pennsylvania's first community health center solar-and-battery backup system, a project designed to protect medical records and $50,000 worth of refrigerated vaccines during outages. Together, the two projects point to a broader local pattern: public institutions across Pittsburgh increasingly betting on on-site power generation to insulate themselves from an unpredictable electric grid.
