Latitude Media: Aligned’s Newest Solar Deal Used Automation to Navigate Local Opposition

Armoracia Solar, a 7.3-megawatt project in western Illinois, almost didn’t get across the finish line. Despite the state’s status as one of the fastest-growing community solar markets in the country, the project ran into local concerns about land use and property values that initially led a county zoning board to reject the project.

But Armoracia, which first applied for permits in 2024, stayed the course, and this week managed to get acquired by Aligned Climate Capital. The project is now on track to be energized later this year, thanks in part to a Bay Area startup with a unique approach to designing and installing solar.

Planted Solar was brought into the project last year to leverage its software and robots to design high-density, terrain‑following arrays and automate the installation process.

The company’s approach drastically reduces the amount of land needed for a solar farm and eliminates site grading, which disturbs topsoil, slows stormwater permitting, and generally prevents the land under an array from being used. Instead, Planted relies on a digital twin of the site to design projects in dense, fixed rows that conform to existing hills and contours. Its solar-installing robots — custom-built tracked hydraulic machines — then drive around the existing, uneven ground, installing posts at the appropriate depth for the terrain following the digital twin.

That method drastically increased the density of Armoracia. The project will now include more than seven MW on 16 acres, compared to an earlier plan that required around 26 acres. That change was central to gaining the approval of the local zoning board, Planted founder and CEO Eric Brown told Latitude Media.

Aligned acquired the project, which is already under construction, through Aligned Solar Partners, a fund focused on financing and managing middle market solar projects. The company in 2025 told Latitude that it is increasingly focusing on community solar; its infrastructure fund dedicated to community solar closed at $40 million over its target last year, even in a difficult fundraising context.

The partnership is a key milestone for Planted’s own growth, Brown said. To build its pipeline of projects, Planted needs institutional buyers to put up the construction financing and own the projects in the long term. Aligned’s acquisition is a commercial-scale vote of confidence in Planted’s approach, signaling to other institutional investors that the technology can support standard tax equity and construction-debt structures. That will make it easier for future projects using Planted’s tech to line up financing and move into construction, he added.

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