On June 3, 2024, the block of capacity for the Community-Driven Community Solar (“CDCS”) category for the 2024-2025 Program Year opened, allocating 13.78 megawatts (“MW”) for Group A and 31.48 MW for Group B. After capacity was allocated to the projects on the 2023-24 waitlist, there was 3.83 MW of capacity available for Group A and 1.32 MW available for Group B, as indicated in the table below.
A total of 17 applications were received during the application window, including 7 project applications totaling 15.57 MW AC for Group A, and 10 project applications totaling 34.74 MW AC for Group B.
| Group A | Group B | |
| Original 2024-25 Program Year Capacity* | 13.78 MW | 31.48 MW |
| Capacity applied to the 2023-24 waitlist projects | 9.95 MW | 30.16 MW |
| Remaining 2024-25 Program Year Capacity | 3.83 MW | 1.32 MW |
*Includes the addition of uncontracted capacity allocation from the 2023-24 Program Year
In accordance with the CDCS scoring guidelines, previously published in both the 2024 Long-Term Renewable Resources Procurement Plan and the Program Guidebook, the Program Administrator scored all projects submitted during the 90-day application window. The scores and a full announcement regarding the scoring process were posted on the Program website’s CDCS page on November 8, 2024. The Program outlined that following the finalization of the score appeal process, the Agency would utilize a random selection process to break ties between projects submitted during the 90-day application window that received tied scores.
On December 11, 2024, a Program Year 2024-25 CDCS Random Selection event, open to stakeholder attendance, was conducted. A recording of the event, the presentation slides, and Q&A are available on the Program’s Webinar page. The resulting spreadsheet detailing Group A and Group B project awards and waitlists for each group (projects receiving scores of at least 10.0) have been added to the Program’s Community-Driven Community Solar page.
Group A Community-Driven Community Solar
For Group A, multiple projects submitted during the 90-day application window received the same score, which necessitated a random selection process for these projects. A command-line script was used to generate random numbers to break tied scores for submitted projects, and projects were selected until the Group A capacity was reached. The Group A selected projects for the 2024-25 Program Year, and the current waitlist are published on the results spreadsheet. Group A CDCS had a total allocation capacity for Program Year 2024-25 of 3.83 MW. As noted in the Program Guidebook, the Agency may consider projects small enough to fit into the capacity available. The projects on the 2023-24 Group A waitlist are too large to fill this capacity, so projects submitted during the 2024-25 Program Year were considered to fill this capacity. Following the project scoring process and Random Selection event, two projects have been selected to fill the block of available capacity. A total of five projects achieving the minimum score of 10.0 points were placed on the Group A waitlist.
Group B Community-Driven Community Solar
For Group B, multiple projects submitted during the 90-day application window received the same score, which necessitated a Random Selection event. During this event, a command- line script was used to generate random numbers to break tied scores for submitted projects, and projects were selected for the Group B waitlist. The Group B waitlisted projects for the 2024-25 Program Year and the current waitlist are published on the results spreadsheet. Following the project scoring process and random selection, a total of 10 projects achieving the minimum score of 10.0 points were placed on the Group B waitlist.
Please see the recording of the live event for a full demonstration of the selection process.
Next Steps
Projects selected in the Random Selection event for the 2024-25 Program Year will be submitted to the next eligible ICC meetings for approval for REC Contracts. Waitlisted projects will be eligible for new capacity released for the 2025- 26 Program Year beginning June 2, 2025.
Thank you!
Illinois Shines Program
[email protected]
