The U.S. government gave preliminary approval for solar energy projects at 24 sites on federal land in six states, potentially accelerating the development process.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and the Environmental Protection Agency, announced the "solar energy zones" during a conference call today.
Approving sites before energy companies seek permission to build on them means developers may avoid such expensive and time-consuming steps as evaluating the potential impact upon the environment and identifying the best use of existing transmission lines.
“We are working hard to rapidly and responsibly develop renewable energy on public lands,” Salazar said today on a conference call. The sites could support up to 24,000 megawatts of solar power on 214,000 acres, he said.
Salazar last month began a similar study of optimal areas to place wind turbines off the Atlantic Coast, resolving potential conflicts with state and environmental regulators over shipping lanes, bird migration paths and tourism.
The streamlined process for approving solar parks on federal may help developers such as BrightSource Energy Inc. and NTR Plc’s Tessera Solar, which are building some of the 1,800 megawatts of projects approved by the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management in the past two months.
For solar projects, federal agencies evaluated 675,000 acres for potential development in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.
Environmental groups objected to some of the sites, saying they are too close to national parks or could endanger sensitive wildlife populations. One such area is the 110,000-acre Iron Mountain zone, which is located between the Joshua Tree National Park and the Mojave Desert National Preserve.
The Wilderness Society studied the 24 areas initially suggested by the Bureau of Land Management and identified just five zones where it supported solar development.
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