Local workers are building the Deep South’s first Community Solar project

Photographs by Zack Smith

TNO News Update, Liana Heath, June 20, 2026

The first Community Solar project in the Deep South is creating more than lower energy bills: it is also creating local union jobs.

Much of the attention around the 22-acre Sisters' Community Solar project has focused on its potential to reduce energy costs for approximately 650 local families. Less discussed is how the project channels the benefits of that investment back into the local economy through workforce development and quality jobs.

IBEW Local 130, a TNO member-institution, is contracted for the build. "We are especially excited because for this work we signed something called a project labor agreement," TNO leader Rodney Wallis of IBEW Local 130 announced at TNO's Delegates Assembly earlier this month. "The PLA is a contract that will ensure local worker participation, a training aspect through apprenticeships, and fair wages."

As Wallis put it, "That is a model for how to create good local jobs in the City of New Orleans.”