The Shelby County Council gave its go-ahead to the financial request associated with a planned 1800 acre solar farm.

On Tuesday night the council approved a tax abatement request by Ranger Power for the 199-megawatt solar power facility.

The county's Board of Zoning Appeals voted 3-to-2 in favor of a variance for the use of the cropland leased from area residents.

Approval of the $175 million project, called “Speedway Solar,” came last week when the county's Board of Zoning Appeals voted 3 to 2 to grant a variance to allow Ranger Power to use the cropland for the commercial solar operation.

Tuesday’s vote was 5-1 with one abstention.

County council member Terry Smith said he felt it was better that he not vote on the abatement although he's been involved in the discussion.  Smith noted that he has family that owns land involved in the solar farm but doesn't own any himself.

County council member Linda Sanders did not vote in favor of abatement.

"I am for the project.  It's just the abatement.  When I read over the information, nothing reall stood out to me that said, my goodness, we have to do this as a county, we have to jump on this, it's a total win-win situation.  And i just felt like with everything we'd be putting into it that it just didn't seem like it was necessary that we needed to embark on this program at this time." 

The solar farm is expected to begin operation in 2023.  Wabash Valley Power has signed a 35-year agreement to purchase the power generated by the solar farm to sell to its customers in central and northern Indiana.