Solar permitting — Caddo Parish, Louisiana

Shreveport metro parish; SWEPCO (AEP/SPP) grid dominant; urban density restricts utility-scale sites to wester. Permitting: Conditional Use Permit; 500-ft max / 150-ft min setbacks. Track record: Rocking R Solar — 72.5 MW, 2025, SWEP

Key driver: Shreveport metro parish; SWEPCO (AEP/SPP) grid dominant; urban density restricts utility-scale sites to western rural fringe; declining population in Shreveport urban core; North Louisiana Electric Cooperative on outer rural fringe; oil-and-gas political culture but not hostile to solar; C-grade reflecting urban land constraints, moderate permitting complexity, and suburban saturation risk

Permitting process

Local permitting pathway

Conditional Use Permit (CUP) — Caddo Parish Commission / Planning Department

Setbacks & buffers

200 ft from property lines; 500 ft from occupied structures in urban zones; 150 ft in rural fringe

Spacing requirements

None established

Size restrictions

Projects near Shreveport typically <20 MW due to land constraints

Penalties & bonding

Total penalty: +28 | Active moratorium: +28

State-level permits & approvals

Parish zoning authority; no state solar preemption; conditional use permit typically required for utility-scale (>1 MW); no mandatory decommissioning bond statewide (some parishes require it)

State policy & grid context

State RPS & clean energy policy

No binding RPS | None | Louisiana has no state RPS; voluntary pilot 350 MW distributed

State incentive programs

Federal ITC eligible; Louisiana sales tax exemption for solar equipment; Louisiana property tax exemption for solar; no state income tax credit for commercial solar

Grid & interconnection

SPP / Southwestern Electric Power Company (SWEPCO)

Subscriber intel Subscribers

Researched for this county and available with a subscription:

• 🔒Project track record
• 🔒Developer intelligence
• 🔒Community & board sentiment
• 🔒Governing board
• 🔒Sentiment & opposition

Energy-related meetings & dockets P1

Halo color = sentiment of the relevant agenda excerpt: green positive, yellow neutral, red negative.

• 2024-01-20 Other

  Data Center

  The Planning Commission approved a special-use permit application for a 150 MW solar farm.

  agenda
• 2024-01-20 Other

  Data Center

  The Planning Commission approved a data center project with a total population of 237,848 and an ideal district size of 19,821.

  agenda
• 2024-01-20 Other

  Data Center

  The Planning Commission approved a special-use permit application for a 150 MW solar farm in District 1.

  agenda
• 2024-01-20 Other

  Transmission

  The Caddo Parish Commission approved a transmission line project that will connect the Southwestern Electric Company transmission line east of Farmridge Road to the Caddo-DeSoto Parish line.

  agenda

State PSC dockets P1

No PSC dockets matched to this county yet.

Local news P3

News ingestion not yet active for this county (GDELT/RSS pipeline pending).