Essentially, portions of public lands in the Western United States are on the fast-track to becoming large scale solar energy fields. The Bureau of Land Management has received about 160 applications for solar projects "covering 1.8 million acres, with a projected capacity to generate 97,000 megawatts of electricity...enough to power 29 million homes, the equivalent of 29 percent of the nation's household electrical consumption."
The broad tracts of lands initially identified in the Western U.S. areas still need to be narrowed to particular locations based on suitability for solar projects and other factors. The evaluation should be complete near late 2010, and "[c]ompanies proposing solar energy projects in designated areas would be able to 'tier' to this study, using it as part of their environmental impact studies for site-specific projects, which are required by the National Environmental Policy Act."
