A group of businesses and organizations in Missouri have committed to using renewable energy through Ameren Missouri.
Ameren is planning to create a solar energy facility, and organizations like Bi-State, Emerson, MasterCard and SSM Health are planning to invest a little extra to use the facility. Patrick Smith, vice president of economic, community and business development, told KMOX that the partners will get renewable energy credits.
"We asked these individual companies and businesses, 'Hey, how much do you want?' And we were actually over-subscribed for this resource," Smith said. "So there's a lot of interest and a lot of demand."
Smith said that using Ameren's facility is much more beneficial for the companies that are investing than if they were to build their own from scratch.
"In a lot of cases, the additional costs of subscribing to our solar resources are lower than or equal to what it would take for them to build their own," he said.
The solar facility will be in White County, Illinois and could begin serving customers as soon as 2024.