News | Turlock Journal | September 2025

Construction complete on canal solar panel project

The first solar-over-canal project in California, built over Turlock Irrigation District canals, is now complete. 

Project Nexus, an initiative led by seven top California research universities, aims to accelerate the deployment of solar panels over California’s extensive canal network.

Work at the 115-foot wide canal began in February with the installation of concrete footings and was completed and energized at the end of August. Project Nexus has a generation capacity of 1.6 MW between the wide-span and narrow-span—which was completed in March—all of which is integrated into TID’s generation portfolio.