Where to Put Solar Power Plants

  • North America's largest solar plant, covering 140 acres, is located near Las Vegas (Photo courtesy of the Nellis Air Force Base)

Environmental groups have pushed for decades to get the federal government solidly behind solar energy. Shawn Allee reports some of them don’t like the government’s most recent effort to promote it:

Transcript

Environmental groups have pushed for decades to get the federal government solidly behind solar energy. Shawn Allee reports some of them don’t like the government’s most recent effort to promote it:

The Federal Bureau of Land Management developed 24 “solar energy study areas” in Western states.

The idea is to identify federal land that might be be good for solar power plants.

Some environmentalists scoured maps of these solar study areas and got concerned.

Jeffrey Morgan is with Tahquitz Sierra Club in California.

Morgan says a solar plant can take up hundreds of acres, and construction could disturb desert tortoise and cactus habitat.

“They have no concept the desert is a vital, living place with a vast diversity of species, unspoiled landscapes and many, many other things. They they just see it as a waste-land. That’s just not true – it’s not a waste-land.”

The Bureau of Land Management says the “solar energy study areas” are just that – they’re for study – and the government would not let solar energy developers disturb critical wildlife habitat.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

Sunny Forecast for Solar Power?

  • North America's largest solar plant, covering 140 acres (Photo courtesy of the Nellis Air Force Base)

President Barack Obama’s visit
to Nellis Air Force Base near
Las Vegas has more to do with
what’s on the ground than it
does the fighter jets in the air.
Lester Graham reports on the base’s
solar energy project:

Transcript

President Barack Obama’s visit
to Nellis Air Force Base near
Las Vegas has more to do with
what’s on the ground than it
does the fighter jets in the air.
Lester Graham reports on the base’s
solar energy project:

Nellis Air Force Base is home to the nation’s largest solar photovoltaic power plant. The system generates enough electricity to power the equivelent of more than 13,000 homes.

The Air Force’s partner in the solar plant is MMA Renewable Ventures. Matt Cheney is CEO.

Cheney says there are lots of advantages, starting with no need for foreign or domestic fossil fuels that emit greenhouse gases.

“It gets its energy from the sun. And, by the way, the sun is pretty predictable and effectively the energy we get from it is free.”

That’s not to say solar energy is free. The array at Nellis Air Force Base cost 100-million dollars to build.

The Air Force saves about a million dollars a year. So, it’s going to take a while to break even.

But as the demand for more solar goes up, the technology gets cheaper, in just a few years you might be able to get solar energy for about the same price as from coal-burning power plants.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links