The Biden administration has finalized a plan to develop photo voltaic on 31 million acres of federal lands in 11 western states.
Extra federal lands for photo voltaic
The proposed up to date Western Photo voltaic Plan is a roadmap for Bureau of Land Administration’s (BLM) governance of photo voltaic vitality proposals and initiatives on public lands.
It bumps up the acreage from the 22 million acres it really useful in January, and this plan provides 5 extra states – Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming – to the six states – Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah – analyzed within the unique plan.
It might make the general public lands obtainable for potential photo voltaic improvement, placing photo voltaic farms nearer to transmission strains or on beforehand disturbed lands and avoiding protected lands, delicate cultural assets, and vital wildlife habitats.
This announcement is a part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, which the White Home is working to speed up forward of the November election. The Investing in America agenda is a authorities initiative targeted on boosting the US economic system by investing in infrastructure, clear vitality, and job creation.
BLM surpassed its objective of allowing greater than 25 gigawatts (GW) of fresh vitality initiatives on public lands earlier in 2024. It’s permitted 29 GW of initiatives on public lands – sufficient to energy over 12 million properties. The Biden administration set the objective to attain 100% clear electrical energy on the US grid by 2035.
Ben Norris, vp of regulatory affairs on the Photo voltaic Vitality Industries Affiliation (SEIA) stated in response to the BLM developments:
Whereas we’re nonetheless reviewing the main points, we’re happy to see that BLM listened to a lot of the photo voltaic trade’s suggestions and added 11 million acres to its unique proposal.
Whereas it is a step in the precise route, fossil fuels have entry to over 80 million acres of public land, 2.5 instances the quantity of public land obtainable for photo voltaic.
One of many quickest methods to decarbonize our grid is to greenlight well-planned clear vitality improvement on federal lands, and the enhancements to this environmental evaluation doc will definitely assist.
Electrek’s Take
The Biden administration is racing to catalyze all of the clear vitality initiatives it might probably between now and the November election, and the most recent iteration of the Western Photo voltaic Plan is an enormous step. It’s designed to alleviate the allowing bottleneck of photo voltaic improvement on public lands whereas preserving protected lands and habitats. Plus, much more land, in fact.
White Home deputy chief of employees Natalie Quillian stated in an interview [via Reuters]: “We’ve been actually pushing ourselves to make use of our govt authority wherever potential to enhance the federal allowing course of.”
Proposed initiatives will nonetheless endure site-specific environmental evaluation and public remark, as they all the time ought to, however that is welcome information for spurring US renewables progress as a result of we’re nonetheless not going quick sufficient.
Learn extra: The US simply beat its objective to allow 25 GW of fresh vitality by 2025
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