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Douglas County commissioners met on Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2025.

Douglas County commissioners have approved geological testing at a solar farm site north of Lawrence, but a judge will now decide whether the testing violates an existing court order in an ongoing lawsuit against the project.

Developers of the Kansas Sky Energy Center — a proposed 159-megawatt solar farm covering 1,105 acres in Douglas County — requested on Wednesday to start geological and soil testing at the site, which will help keep the project moving along if it overcomes its ongoing lawsuit and proceeds as planned.

As the Journal-World reported, Douglas County District Court Judge James McCabria was previously asked to decide whether testing work could begin at the proposed site before the item was to be considered by commissioners. Residents of Grant Township opposed the testing, arguing it would disrupt the land.

The memo in the agenda said McCabria advised the County Commission to consider approving the plans based on existing policies, and if approved in whole or in part, the county will likely seek judicial review to make sure the plans don’t violate the current court order to halt construction on the solar farm.

The Grant Township Board submitted written public comment to commissioners regarding the agenda item, arguing that the testing does in fact violate the judge’s court order to stop construction, that the township was not given an opportunity to evaluate the impact of the testing, among other things.

At Wednesday’s meeting, a few public commenters spoke in favor of the approval and others – including Nancy Thellman, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit and former county commissioner – spoke in opposition of beginning the testing until the lawsuit was resolved.

Commissioner Gene Dorsey said it was initially his impression that this work would violate the current court order to halt the construction on the project, and he asked what would happen if the commissioners delayed the vote until the lawsuit ran its course.

Damon Ray, a project manager with Evergy – the utility company set to own and operate the solar farm, said the purpose of the testing is to begin facilitating the engineering design of the project, and that’s a process that takes time.

“The projects take a long time to plan before you can actually get on site and begin construction,” Ray said. “So with the injunction in place, we can’t start construction, but we want to be able to continue that planning process in the event that is lifted and we are able to start construction. We want to be able to do that in a timely manner.”

The testing would need to be completed in a six-week window sometime between now and Oct. 22, 2026, and it is planned to occur on 13 properties across five sections in Grant Township. Some of the proposed testing work on the site includes:

• 13 boreholes, 17 test pits, and 12 soil sample areas each measuring 25 feet by 25 feet.

• 26 metal pilings driven to depths ranging from 6.5 feet to 8 feet.

• 9 infiltration pits that would be dug to a maximum depth of 10 feet to learn about groundwater conditions and other such geological factors.

County planner Karl Bauer said there would be no permanent infrastructure or equipment that will be installed solely from the testing activity, so staff doesn’t anticipate any permanent impact to any wetlands, floodplain or prime soils on the properties. He added that once the testing is complete, agricultural practices on the land could continue.

The Kansas Sky Energy Center has been trying to begin construction quickly to meet a new federal deadline set by the Trump administration. The new rules say large solar projects must be “substantially under construction” by July 6 to qualify for valuable federal tax credits.

However, the July 6 deadline falls just three months after the expected start of the Douglas County trial on April 6, which will examine the legality of the solar farm. A spokesperson from Evergy previously told the Journal-World it was confident the project would meet the deadline, though it did not provide specifics on how that would be achieved with the tight timeline.

The Kansas Sky Energy Center would include roughly 8 million square feet of solar panels mounted on thousands of steel pilings. The project has received both support and opposition from Douglas County residents, and it is expected to generate enough renewable energy to power approximately 30,000 homes annually.

In other business, county commissioners:

• Approved allocation adjustments for 2025 and a reimbursement schedule for 2026 for substance use treatment services to support Douglas County residents who are uninsured, underinsured, or unable to access these services in the county.

• Held an executive session for “preliminary discussion of the acquisition of real property and consultation with legal counsel about the potential acquisition.”