The flagship development is the Esmerelda 7 solar and battery energy storage system (BESS) project, which comprises seven utility-scale solar facilities with a combined 5.35GW of generation capacity.
The US Bureau of Land Management (BLM), part of the Department of Interior, has advanced on 15 clean energy projects across the West, with two solar PV and storage plants operational in California.
US Secretary of The Interior Deb Haaland has announced plans to expand solar deployment on public lands across the west of the country, including three major solar projects in Arizona representing just under 1GW of capacity.
The Bureau of Land Management, part of the US Department of the Interior, has authorised the 500MW Palen Solar project owned by EDF Renewable Energy, near Desert Center, in Riverside County, California.
The outgoing Obama administration made a push for renewables by passing a regulation by the Interior Department that could boost wind and solar projects built on public lands in California, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.
US power engineering firm Bechtel’s major Soda Mountain solar project has been approved by the US Department of Interior (DOI), but only after a 71MW capacity reduction, following an extensive three-year environmental analysis of the project area.