The Obama administration announced plans to move forward with using public lands for solar projects in six Western states, including Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, California, New Mexico and Utah.
The project is the result of the Solar Energy Development Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (also referred to as just PEIS), a collaborative study conducted by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Bureau of Land Management, and U.S. Department of Interior.
The report was compiled “in order to assess environmental impacts associated with the development and implementation of agency-specific programs that would facilitate environmentally responsible utility-scale solar energy development,” according to the PEIS website, and it also highlights the zones in which solar energy will be developed.
Nevada’s zones are Amargosa Valley, Dry Lake, Dry Lake Valley North, Gold Point and Millers. The PEIS website also provides information about “public involvement,” such as “protests to land use plan amendments,” for which members of the public can file formal protests against proposed solar development. To read more from the PEIS, including the full downloadable document of the report, visit http://solareis.anl.gov/index.cfm.