Land allocation plans discussed for renewable energy development in California
Joshua trees with Cima Dome in the background, Mojave Desert, California (source: flickr/ Mollivan Jon, creative commons)
Francisco Rojas
11 Mar 2015
Regulators will initially focus on about 10 million acres of federal land overseen by the U.S. BLM in the Mojave and other Southern California deserts for renewable energy project development
Local news from California inform that new changes on land allocation in the estate’s desert regions is being discussed in order to “move forward on less than half the California desert land initially designated for renewable energy plants”.
According to the local source, “regulators will initially focus on about 10 million acres of federal land overseen by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management in the Mojave and other Southern California deserts. Their initial plan, unveiled in September, designated 22.5 million acres across seven counties.”
The local governments will then decide how they want to handle large-scale solar, wind and geothermal projects in the aforementioned regions. The authors of this project expect that “70,000 acres would be needed for projects to produce 20,000 megawatts by 2040”
Despite the apparent good news, there are concerns by the local population regarding the current use of farmland (a significant amount of land allocation would fall on farming areas), high unemployment and the impact the plan could have on local flora and fauna.
Source: SF Gate
