Solar in Phillips County

Territory shares by land area (Colorado Energy Office map): Highline Electric Association, about 100%; City of Holyoke (municipal electric), about 0%; Town of Haxtun (municipal electric), about 0%. The county seat, Holyoke, maps to City of Holyoke (municipal electric).

The largest by area, Highline Electric Association, is a electric cooperative that pays for excess generation at an avoided-cost rate well below retail.

Phillips County declined about 2.5% between 2020 and 2025 (4,534 → 4,420). It has 3 communities on our map, the largest being Holyoke, Haxtun, Paoli.

The county is fairly uniform in elevation — Holyoke near 3,730 feet and the geographic center around 3,770 feet — so conditions are relatively consistent across it.

It’s part of our Eastern Plains region. The county center is about 152 miles from our Denver office.

Permitting in Phillips County depends on whether you’re inside a town. Towns with their own building departments issue their own permits; unincorporated areas go through the county, and the State Electrical Board handles electrical permits in many smaller jurisdictions.

Phillips County businesses are split between Highline Electric Association and City of Holyoke (municipal electric) — a electric cooperative and a town-owned utility — with different commercial net-metering terms, so two shops a few miles apart can have different paybacks.

Out on the plains the loads that matter are grain elevators, feedlots and dairies, irrigation pumping, equipment dealers, county and school buildings, and small-town main streets. Land is cheap and roofs are often metal, so ground mounts and barn roofs are common, and the co-op's rules on irrigation and commercial accounts decide the design. As of September 2026, business owners can still use the federal §48E credit for solar placed in service by the end of 2027, with 100% bonus depreciation restored — details are on our Phillips County commercial page and worth a conversation with your tax advisor.