The United States Bureau of Land Management has recently approved and signed off on a 690-megawatt solar power plant. The 7,100-acre solar farm will stretch along Interstate 15, about 30 miles northeast of Las Vegas, Nevada.
The $1 billion project is set to be completed by December of 2023 and will be named Gemini solar farm. Two companies will be working together on the project; Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners and Arevia Power.
Included in the project will be large scale storage batteries, and the plan is to provide energy to Nevada’s largest public utility, NV Energy. They have signed a 25-year power purchase agreement with the developers and have agreed to pay $38.44 per megawatt-hour for electricity over the 25 years.
Managing partner and co-founder of Quinbrook, David Scaysbrook said;
Gemini plans to showcase at scale what we believe to be one of the most promising technological advances in renewable power. The project will demonstrate the ability to couple solar PV technology with battery storage to capture and use Nevada’s abundant renewable solar resource to deliver low-cost power to NV Energy’s customers and keep the lights on long after the sun has set.
NV Energy president and chief executive, Doug Cannon recently commented about the new solar panels and energy storage units:
Today’s decision brings the environmental and price benefits of low-cost solar energy to our customers. We are proud to be delivering a renewable energy vision to our customers that also supports Nevada’s economic and sustainability goals, [it] allows us to extend the benefits of renewable energy to times when the sun is not shining.
This is part of a plan for Nevada to produce at least 50% of its energy from renewables by 2030 and 100% by 2050. In 2018, NV Energy was able to produce 24% of its energy from renewables.
It’s certainly a step in the right direction and hopefully, more states will follow suit with California and start mandating that new houses be built with solar panels. If this is also accomplished, then Nevada could end up hitting much better renewable numbers by 2030.
As reported by cleantechnica, there is reason for concern about this project because the solar farm will be built on BLM (Bureau of Land Management) or public land. They say this opens the door for the government to use federal land for future fracking, coal mining, or oil drilling. However, with the world waking up and not being so willing to accept the select few to destroy the planet perhaps that will not be so easy for them to do.
Some others who are opposed to the project include Defenders of Wildlife, the National Parks Conservation Association, and the Sierra Club that have concerns about the desert tortoise. They say this solar project could lead to their extinction.
“There is no justification for this project that outweighs the importance of the desert tortoise, its habitat and BLM’s obligations to use its full authority to take actions that will contribute to the recovery of this threatened species,” Jeff Aardahl, a biologist with Defenders of Wildlife, wrote in September.
I am someone who loves animals and protecting the planet. I hope that the desert tortoise survives and that campaigners find new ways to preserve the species. However, I would argue that the extinction of all life as we know it is of the utmost importance and burning fossil fuels has been taking us there faster than at any other time in the history of the planet.
Update: A new article about research that shows solar panels to be beneficial to the desert tortoises can be found here.
