WEC Energy Group is adding $3.3 billion to its new five-year capital investment plan, including an additional $1.4 billion in renewable energy generation.
The plan, which covers 2024 to 2028 now calls for $23.4 billion in spending, up from $20.1 billion in the plan covering 2023 to 2027. WEC Energy Group is the parent company of a number of utilities in Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan and Minnesota, including We Energies.
Gale Klappa, executive chairman of WEC Energy Group, said the increased spending is being primarily driven by economic development in the I-94 corridor in southeastern Wisconsin. In a call with analysts, Klappa repeatedly mentioned
Microsoft’s plans for a data center campus as one of the major drivers.
The plan includes around 1,400 megawatts of new electricity generation capacity to support Microsoft’s project in Mount Pleasant and other economic development in the region. Klappa specifically mentioned
Haribo’s gummi bear factory in Pleasant Prairie, which opened this year and could soon be expanded, and additional expansion plan for
Uline in 2025.
“The new capacity is really going to be needed for energy security and for us to continue to decarbonize,” Klappa said.
Other investment increases include an additional $1.3 billion for natural gas generation, $800 million more for natural gas storage and an additional $1 billion for investments at
American Transmission Co., of which WEC is a part owner.
The need for investment in WEC’s regulated energy segments is enough that the company opted to reduce its planned spending in its energy infrastructure segment by $1.5 billion. Over the past several years, WEC has invested nearly $3 billion acquiring ownership in wind and solar projects in Illinois, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas. In most cases, major corporations and tech companies are the ones purchasing the electricity generated by those projects.
“There’s no lack of opportunity as we see it in the infrastructure,” Klappa said, reiterating that the company is choosing to invest in its regulated utility business because of the plans made by Microsoft and others.
WEC executives declined to get into specifics of what kinds of renewables the company would add to its generation capacity. In recent years, WEC has invested heavily in solar and battery storage, including projects in Kenosha and Walworth counties.
Those projects, however, have faced delays and cost increases as the company deals with restrictions on solar panel imports aimed at Chinese products.
Scott Lauber, president and CEO of WEC Energy Group, said the panels have begun to clear customs and should be arriving at projects this year and next.
Klappa said the company has begun the process of ordering equipment for the new generation capacity and is working to identify potential sites. Projects to add the new capacity would likely be done in 2025 through 2028.
As for the company’s existing capacity, the process of converting the newer units at the Oak Creek Power Plant from coal to natural gas is underway with new burners being installed this fall and next spring.
WEC is still planning to retire two older units at the Oak Creek in May 2024 and the other two in late 2025.
As part of the new capital plan, WEC now estimates it will be able to stop its use of coal completely by 2032, three years earlier than previously planned.
