While an isolated generating station may require several hundred acres of land, solar farms will cover several thousand acres to generate an equivalent amount of power.
WSJ AUGUST 14, 2012 Several weeks ago in a remarkable but little-noticed policy directive, the Interior Department announced that it will allow construction permitting on 285,000 acres of public land in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah for solar energy projects. Even more remarkable, Interior said that energy firms can petition Interior to build solar installations “on approximately 19 million acres”—a larger land mass than Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont combined.
I supposed clean energy is a worthy goal, but it would be nice if our quest for cleaner air didn’t result in the destruction of our hills, deserts and seascapes.
Related articles
- The Solar-Painted Desert (junkscience.com)
- U.S. unveils solar energy blueprint (upi.com)
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