D3Energy expands floating solar development on Florida stormwater ponds

D3Energy announced an exclusive statewide master lease agreement with the Florida Department of Transportation that gives the company sole rights to develop floating solar systems on FDOT stormwater ponds located within highway rights-of-way across Florida.

The agreement positions stormwater ponds as a new category of renewable energy infrastructure, allowing solar generation to be deployed without using agricultural land, conservation areas or developable property. D3Energy said its first project under the agreement — a floating photovoltaic array on an FDOT pond in Orlando developed with the Orlando Utilities Commission — was commissioned earlier this year.

“In Florida, the bottleneck on new solar is rarely capital or technology — it's available land. This lease solves that at the state level,” said Stetson Tchividjian, managing director of D3Energy, in a press release. “It took years of work with FDOT to get here. With our first project now in the water and operating, we're ready to roll this out to partners across the state.”

According to D3Energy, the statewide inventory of FDOT stormwater ponds could support more than 1 gigawatt of floating photovoltaic capacity — enough to power more than 200,000 homes while avoiding the conversion of an estimated 5,000 acres for ground-mounted solar development. The company said the framework also streamlines site access and permitting coordination through a single statewide agreement, potentially accelerating deployment for utilities and energy partners.