A farm in Shelby County is known for harvesting flowers, strawberries and now solar energy.

Thanks to federal dollars, small businesses across Kentucky are installing their own renewable energy projects at half the cost.

Kentucky Additions.

June LaFleur has more.

Our look at weather and climate.

Just a quick rundown.

We open in April with our ten greenhouses.

So again, extremely substantial amount of energy keeping these greenhouses heated and cooled and at the correct temperatures and running the water systems through here.

July we have our fresh produce.

So we're running machines to to clean, to process that produce that we pick.

And our green beans are again utilized.

We have squash, zucchini, we have soybeans, we have corn.

We're really well known for known for our sweet corn.

We have field corn.

So there's there's a lot that goes on and a lot of moving parts.

And they all require some sort of energy.

So that's why we decided to take the take the plunge.

Gautrain Farms decided to install rooftop solar panels.

Which offsets 83% of their electrical usage and saves them, you know, half a million dollars over the course of the 30 year warranty life of this system.

It's kind of neat because I feel like a lot of people don't really know or utilize what you know, what the Earth provides for us.

Solar panels save money in the long run, but federal programs have sped up the return on investment, starting with a tax credit that covers 30% of the installation.

And for many small businesses, a grant through the U.S. Department of Agriculture that covers half of the costs.

In this particular case, it's an agriculturally related business.

But we've we've done a Burger King in the middle of Ashland, Kentucky.

We've done auto dealerships, IGA groceries around Kentucky.

The Rural Energy for America program, or REAP grant has helped hundreds of Kentucky businesses install their own renewable energy projects.

Not just solar.

The grants not new, but it ramped up just a few years ago.

It's been ongoing.

But the Biden-Harris administration, through the Inflation Reduction Act, which was a bipartisan act with Congress and the president in, has greatly increased the amount of money.

So we used to only match 25%.

Now, the Inflation Reduction Act, we've been able to match provide match of 50%.

In this case, we're promoting economic development, working with small businesses, enabling them to operate more efficiently so that their bottom line makes more sense to them and gives them some freedom and choices in how they want to reinvest those dollars.

So that's what we're always trying to do, is continue to reinvest in the farm, reinvest in the business and reinvest in the land.

And land keeps us going where it farm.

So, you know, we want to treat it as well as we can for as long as we can.

And this was just one other way to try and do so.

For Kentucky Edition, I'm June Leffler.

Thanks, June.

Businesses aren't the only ones getting solar Renters and people who lost their homes to a disaster are also getting a piece of the solar share.

We'll have those stories in the weeks to come.