Power Plants in Minnesota

Minnesota holds 19.9 GW of nameplate generating capacity, ranking 25th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia. This is what the equipment could produce running flat out, not what it actually generates — a megawatt of solar and a megawatt of nuclear appear the same here and produce very different amounts of electricity over a year.

Natural gas leads the fleet at 32.4%, followed by wind at 25%, coal at 17%, and solar and nuclear nearly tied at 9.5% and 9.4%. The largest plant by far is Sherburne County, a coal facility with 1,704 MW. Prairie Island, a nuclear plant, adds 1,186 MW, and Clay Boswell, another coal plant, brings 923 MW. Mankato Energy Center, burning natural gas, reaches 741 MW, and Monticello Nuclear Facility rounds out the top five at 685 MW.

The fleet spans nearly a century, from Thief River Falls, which came online in August 1927, to Novel Bo Hu 1 Solar (CSG), which entered service in January 2026. The 804 plants tracked by the state include everything from large power stations down to sub-megawatt backup generators, so the count alone says little about fleet size; capacity is what matters.