Illinois Solar Map

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Data update, hotlinks, and new map buckets

Published on May 08, 2025 by Derek Eder

As of May 8, 2025, an additional 327 megawatts (MW) of solar have been energized in the State of Illinois, bringing the total to 4,648 MW. 83,542 solar projects have been energized in our state.

Additionally, 1,515 MW of planned solar projects have been added since our update last month. The majority of this increase (1,420 MW) is in the planned Large Distributed Generation (Large DG) category. Projects appear to be spread throughout the entire state.

Category Apr 11, 2025 May 8, 2025 Change
Energized 4,321 MW 4,648 MW +327 MW
Planned 4,610 MW 6,125 MW +1,515 MW

Data from our 3 primary sources are updated at different intervals, so the above data is valid as of the following the dates:

  • Illinois Adjustable Block Program (ABP) May 2025
  • Illinois Solar for All (ILSFA) May 2025
  • US EIA-860M (Utility scale projects) March 2024

You can now link directly to places in the IL Solar Map. Every time you click on a map feature, the URL will update. You can then share this link around to point people to specific locations. Here’s a few examples of geographies with the most energized solar in Illinois:

While we’re at it, here are the places with the least amount of energized solar in Illinois:

I won’t list them here, but there are 1,050 Census designated places (cities, villages, etc) and 487 tracts that have 0 kW of solar energized.

New map bucket sizes

Since we launched this project two years ago, over 3 gigawatts of solar have come online in the State of Illinois. To continue to make the maps easy to read, we have updated the numbers we are shading the map by to account for the larger numbers.

New bucket sizes for the IL Solar Map
New bucket sizes for the IL Solar Map

Note the differences between these two maps. They are showing the same data, but the map on the right is shaded with higher numbers. Without doing this, eventually the gradual increase in solar projects would make these maps all one color!