Feds to open Western lands for solar project

The Obama administration Monday announced it would fast-track solar-energy development in the West, with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar signing an order setting aside more than 1,000 square miles of public land for two years of study and environmental review.

The government will help companies build powerful solar farms in the desert Southwest by pre-qualifying huge swaths of federal land for development.

The Department of Interior said Monday it will designate 670,000 acres of federal land in Nevada, Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah as study areas for utility-scale solar projects.

The land will be divided into 24 tracts called Solar Energy Study areas.

Salazar said the department will work with states on environmental studies and permitting to speed solar development in those areas.

More than half of it — 351,000 acres in the Mojave Desert — is in California. According to maps released by the Interior Department, the California solar-project areas abut the border of Joshua Tree National Park, the Mojave Preserve and three national wildlife refuges in the southeastern part of the state.

The proposed solar-generating areas in California are projected to have the capacity to produce 39,000 to 70,000 megawatts of electricity annually at full development — enough to serve millions of homes. There now are three large solar projects undergoing environmental review in the state.

The president has promised to promote the use of federal land for the production of alternative energy and has set a goal of obtaining 10 percent of the nation's electricity from renewable sources by 2010. Salazar vowed to have 13 "commercial-scale" solar projects under construction by the end of 2010.

Federal land managers already have announced plans to establish areas of concentrated wind and geothermal energy harvesting. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has received about 470 renewable-energy project applications. Those include 158 active solar applications, covering 1.8 million acres.

Salazar announced the order Monday in Las Vegas with Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, in a courtyard shaded by a solar-power array at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

"We are putting a bull's-eye on the development of solar energy on our public lands," Salazar said.

Conservation groups reacted to the announcement with praise but cautioned that even green projects could conflict with protected lands and sensitive species.

"We support the identification of the best places for renewable energy on public lands," said Alex Daue of the Wilderness Society. "We can't have a repeat of the oil and gas industry, where it's spread wide across the landscape anywhere they want. We need a focused look at places were there's the least conflict and highest opportunity for success."

Bureau officials said the goal will be to identify lands of at least three square miles with solar exposure, suitable slopes and proximity to existing or designated roads and transmission lines. Wilderness, high-conservation-value lands and lands with conflicting uses were excluded. Setting aside the sites, called Solar Energy Study Areas, would prevent new mining claims and other third-party use during the studies.

An industry official hailed Salazar's promise to clear a logjam in utility-scale solar developments. The BLM said it has 158 active applications for solar power plants pending.

"In 2007, more than 7,000 permits on BLM lands were approved for oil and gas energy developers," Solar Energy Industries Association chief Rhone Resch said in a statement. "To date, zero permits have been approved for solar energy projects."

Salazar said the bureau was already considering environmental reviews for two projects in Nevada. The NextLight Silver State South would have a solar array producing 267 megawatts, and NextLight Silver State North would produce about 140 megawatts.

Salazar said the two plants combined would produce more electricity than a "mid-sized" coal-fired plant that can produce 350 megawatts.