Blue Jay: The blueprint for tomorrow’s solar sites is operating today in Texas

Across 2,700 acres in Grimes County, Texas, the Blue Jay solar-plus-storage plant is redefining what utility-scale renewable energy can accomplish. With 658,000 solar panels generating 270 megawatts of clean power and a 59-megawatt battery storage system, Blue Jay delivers the scale expected from modern solar infrastructure. What sets it apart is how seamlessly it integrates breakthrough technologies, ecological restoration, and community partnerships into a single operational model.

Blue Jay shows the evolution of solar development beyond clean electricity generation alone. The site demonstrates how next-generation solar facilities can simultaneously address equipment maintenance, vegetation management, ecological impact, and local engagement — which led to Blue Jay placing as a finalist for “Solar Ranch of the Year” in the North American Agrivoltaics Awards. Blue Jay employs innovative approaches that traditional solar operations handle as separate challenges.

Drone-in-a-box: Autonomous operations reshape maintenance strategies 

Blue Jay operates one of the most advanced autonomous maintenance systems ever deployed at a solar facility, drone-in-a-box, positioning Enel among the leading users of autonomous drone technology in utility-scale solar operations.

After securing regulatory waivers that allow operations beyond visual line of sight without a remote pilot in command, Blue Jay can launch drone missions from anywhere in the world. This regulatory achievement puts Enel at the forefront of the industry, as these waivers are notoriously difficult to obtain until recent changes in aviation regulations made them accessible for controlled environments like solar facilities.

The operational impact is significant. Traditional comprehensive site inspections require contracting external providers at high costs or dedicating internal technicians for weeks while sacrificing other maintenance activities. Autonomous drones at the Blue Jay site complete full thermal and visual assessments of the entire 2,700-acre facility in under a month at essentially no marginal cost beyond initial system investment.

The drone-in-a-box technology captures high-resolution digital imagery alongside detailed thermal data that reveals hidden equipment problems. When solar panels develop faults, they generate additional electrical resistance that shows up as heat signatures, appearing like a candle in the night on thermal imaging, compared to properly functioning panels around them. These thermal anomalies often indicate production losses hidden in data rounding errors that standard monitoring systems miss, but which create system strain and increase vulnerability to larger faults.

Once drones complete their missions and return to base, captured data is automatically uploaded to processing partners, who analyze findings and generate actionable maintenance reports. This seamless workflow from autonomous flight to actionable intelligence eliminates the traditional bottleneck between detecting problems and addressing them.

With sophisticated imaging, the same drone system optimizes Blue Jay’s other innovative programs. Vegetation mapping data directs sheep grazing efforts to areas with the highest biomass concentration, while thermal imaging can potentially monitor the health of pollinator habitats. By using drones, the Blue Jay site shows how autonomous systems can serve multiple operational needs simultaneously, creating value that exceeds the sum of individual components.

“It’s very professionally rewarding to see the technology proliferate, to be able to share it with my colleagues, to make my colleagues' lives in the field easier and more effective,” said Bill Badnaruk, Head of Industrial Risk and Cross Technology Improvement at Enel North America, who spearheaded the drone-in-a-box deployment. “The ability to potentially scale this with our global counterparts is incredibly powerful and important to me.”

Agricultural integration creates multi-purpose land use

Blue Jay participates in the largest solar grazing agreement announced in the United States, with more than 13,000 sheep managing vegetation across eight Enel solar farms spanning 12,600 acres. The approach transforms traditional vegetation management from a maintenance expense into an agricultural opportunity that benefits energy operations and local sheep-herding businesses.

"Enel’s record-breaking collaboration with Texas Solar Sheep is an exciting step forward for sustainable dual-use solar practices,” said Marcus Krembs, head of external relations and sustainability at Enel North America. “By prioritizing sheep grazing for land management, we demonstrate how solar and agriculture can coexist while ensuring optimal performance of our solar facilities.”

Solar sheep grazing isn’t just new for energy companies. Hodges Livestock owners Kade and Morgan Hodges faced challenges when they lost access to leased grazing land, threatening their family’s ranching heritage. Solar grazing provided a solution that preserved their agricultural livelihood while contributing to renewable energy operations. The Hodges manage more than 200 sheep at Blue Jay and another Enel facility, and their innovative work earned recognition from the Texas Farm Bureau as recipients of the 2024 Outstanding Young Farmer & Rancher Award.

The sheep provide natural vegetation control that often surpasses mechanical alternatives. As selective grazers, they maintain optimal vegetation levels while allowing native plants to establish and flourish. This creates genuine agricultural ecosystems within solar facilities rather than landscapes requiring constant mechanical intervention.

“To us, the grass needs to be mowed one way or another,” said Thomas Moon, Blue Jay’s site manager. “If we can have animals out here, and I don't have to have mechanical machines moving that are going to cause damage to modules, it's just a no-brainer.”

Ecological partnerships strengthen regional habitats

Blue Jay extends its environmental impact through multiple habitat restoration initiatives. The site features active apiaries maintained by military veterans through Hives for Heroes, a nonprofit organization that connects veterans and first responders with beekeeping and conservation opportunities. Since launching the program in 2024, Enel has partnered with Hives for Heroes at the Blue Jay and Roseland solar farms, with plans to expand to additional sites.

The facility also includes custom pollinator-friendly habitats developed through collaboration with McDonald’s, Blue Jay’s major power purchaser. A specially designed seed mix revegetates 20 acres of the site specifically to support regional pollinator species.

Additionally, Blue Jay’s 59-megawatt battery energy storage system captures excess solar generation during peak production hours and dispatches electricity when grid demand is highest, maximizing system value and grid reliability. This storage capability enables the facility to provide grid services that support regional electricity stability. Meanwhile, the McDonald’s power purchase agreement at the solar plant, which includes five members of their North American Logistics Council, demonstrates how corporate clean energy procurement can reduce supply chain emissions through coordinated renewable energy purchasing.

Scaling the model for industry transformation

Blue Jay’s success proves that utility-scale solar development can simultaneously deliver reliable clean energy, support local agriculture, restore ecological habitats, and create community opportunities. Rather than just minimizing land use impact, this approach maximizes land use value through integrated systems that serve multiple beneficial purposes.

“What excites me about the Blue Jay solar site is that we're continuing to innovate,” said Jesse Puckett, director of sustainability projects and community affairs. “We've added sheep grazing, we have beekeeping, we have pollinator habitat, but it's producing energy and also producing an economic benefit to the local economy, to local farmers, to local beekeepers. It's providing an economic base for this community.”

As the solar industry continues expanding to meet energy goals, facilities like Blue Jay point toward a future where renewable energy infrastructure actively contributes to agricultural productivity, ecological health, and community prosperity. The blueprint for tomorrow’s solar sites is operating today — and it shows the most effective clean energy solutions serve multiple purposes while maintaining operational excellence.