It’s time for Rural Electric Coops to lead

Earlier this year, the PowerXchange conference focussed on success stories from across the country, uplifting best practices from rural electric cooperatives planning for the future. 

The overall sentiment of the conference, and the keynote from NRECA director, Jim Matheson, was that now is the time to lead.

Philip Fracica, from Renew Missouri (one of the organizational leaders of Rural Power Coalition), was there to take the pulse of the industry and advocate for deepening the democratic decision-making within rural electric coops (RECs).

“We heard from a handful of cooperatives about their success with owning and operating wind projects, solar projects, and even solar plus storage. We heard from the RECs that they are having success with delivering broadband services across their service territory and are seeing an increase in revenue from these efforts,” shared Fracica upon his return. 

A few of the REC projects that stand out include Cobb EMC, which is rolling out a 1.5 MW solar plus storage project to create a micro-grid for some of their members, Dairyland Power in IL is building 900 kW and 1.5 MW of solar energy for their member-owners, and the Iowa Lakes cooperative (in IA) has already built 14 wind turbines for 21 MW total, and they have the capacity to add another 7 MW in the near future!

With all that said, the highlight of the conference was when the Rural Utility Service (RUS) from the USDA shared and launched the program descriptions for the New ERA (Empowering Rural America) and what is now called PACE (Powering Affordable Clean Energy) programs, specifically designed for cooperatives and offering over $10B in funding for clean energy projects (see our guide to these programs here). 

And this brings us back to how the conference began, with Matheson’s celebration of these historic investments in rural electric cooperatives and the call for REC leadership across the country to pick up the reigns and lead!

Here are some highlights from the keynote: