Desert Tortoise Council Symposium 2020

February 22, 2020 - Las Vegas NV - Basin and Range Watch tries to attend every symposium on desert tortoises hosted by the Desert Tortoise Symposium (even when we were snowed out in Kingman in 2019 and never made it!). STAY TUNED for UPDATES.

This year we noticed a consulting company lift one of our photos to use in its sales sheet on tortoise monitoring gear at a vendor table. We do not appreciate this and let the company know they need to remove our photo. They had not asked permission, and we take copyright infringement of our photos seriously.

Adult female Mojave desert tortoise at her burrow next to a tall pencil cholla in 2011, found in Ivanpah Valley CA on the future site of the Stateline Solar Project--this scene is now gone, full of photovoltaic panels. Photo by Laura Cunningham Copyright 2020. Do not use without permission.

^Copyright infringement of the use of our photo, lifted from the Basin and Range Watch website, by a private company selling wildlife monitoring equipment.

Some highlights of the conference:

The agencies spent a session discussing the latest threats to the desert tortoise, including road mortality and raven predation. Studies on the best exclusion fences to line highways, and culverts to allow tortoises to pass under roads, were discussed. Raven management was also explored, including increasing use of egg-oiling, where vegetatble oil is used to spray raven eggs in nests, supphocating the eggs and helping to reduce the raven populations that has exploded in the California Desert.

Seed collection, and vertical mulching on off-road incursions were mentioned as a way to reduce habitat damage to Areas of Critical Environmental Concerns (ACECs).

Sahara mustard and other invasive plants are a huge and growing problem, with hand-pulling and local herbicide application as a few ways to deal with the problem.

Yet strangely there was no discussion of the gigantic threat of large-scale solar projects to the desert tortoise.

Vincent James of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said that rangewide surveys were ongoing, and several critical habitat units were surveyed using line distance sampling in 2019. Several more were scheduled to be surveyed in 2020.

Researcher Brian Wallace related that although about 60% of Mojave desert tortoise habitat is on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), BLM still does not have a cohesive management strategy across all field offices.

Dr. Kristin Berry of the U.S. Geological Survey, discussed questions of diseases in desert tortoises: Ivanpah Valley shows more pneumonia symptoms in tortoises, but the population is top-heavy with adults. There are very few juveniles and young adults, possibly from the two large transmission lines that pass over the desert here, serving as nest and perch sites for raven predators. Meanwhile in Goffs and Fenner valley, shell disease is more prevalent, a metabolic disorder that could be a legacy of World War II military activity in the area from the rail and roads. Toxins could still be in the soil and plants.

Frances Origgi from the University of Bern, Switzerland, discussed how testudine herpesviruses and their tortoise hosts are usually in equilibrium, having co-evolved over time. But the environment is incredibly important--when stressors such as drought and toxins disturb this equilibrium and the immune system of tortoises is overwhelmed, the disease comes out and tortoises become symptomatic and sick. More on tortoises >>here.

Stealth Land Grab in the Great Basin: Final Environmental Impact Statement Out For Fallon Range Training Complex Modernization

February 4, 2020 - Nevada - The Navy released its Final Environmental Impacts Statement (EIS) on January 10, 2020. Public review ends on February 10, 2020. See the video, above here: https://vimeo.com/285543688.

The Navy's Preferred Alternative is Alternative 3, which would tweak the expansion to avoid Fairview Peak, the Sand Springs Range, and access to the Rawhide Mine. Some other new areas would see a slight expansion or restricted area where consultation with the Navy and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) would be needed.

Recreationists are largely the losers in the Preferred Alternative, as this alternative would have significant impacts on public recreation: approximately 421,005 acres would no longer be accessible to the public. The Navy says impacts would be reduced to some extent by allowing bighorn sheep hunting within B-17 through a Memorandum of Agreement between NDOW and the Navy. Also, large racing events that currently occur near B-16, B-17, and B-19 would continue on those ranges in accordance with the requirements listed in the Large Event Race Activities section of Chapter 2 of the Final EIS. Additionally, B-17 would be shifted off the Sand Springs Range and Fairview Peak; therefore, these areas would remain publicly accessible.

Under Alternative 3, the Navy is proposing that Congress remove the designation as a Wilderness Study Area from those portions of the Clan Alpine, Job Peak, and Stillwater Wilderness Study Areas within the Dixie Valley Training Area to accommodate training activities. The BLM would continue managing the remaining portions of the Wilderness Study Areas.

Read more >>here.

Thank you for Your Support in 2019! We Will Carry This Forward to Defend the Desert in 2020

^Stonewall Mountain in Nevada covered with snow on December 28, 2019, after a snowstorm earlier in the month.

December 30, 2019 - The volunteers at Basin and Range Watch want to thank you for your very generous donations, support, tips, and comments you sent in to government agencies opposing bad projects that harm our public lands deserts. We are a grassroots non-profit that relies on local community support and knowledge, good science, natural history observations, and getting out into the field to watch the desert and record desert developments and degradation with notes and photographs. No other group does what we do in California and Nevada.

Visit this page on the snowstorm of December 2019 in the desert.

Gemini Solar Project Final Environmental Impact Statement Out

^Rare milkvetches (Astragalus) inhabit the sandy flats of the California Wash next to the Muddy Mountains Wilderness Area, where the Gemini Solar Project is proposed to grade and "mow" the Mojave Desert scrub vegeation in order to construct a 7,100-acre utility-scale solar project--photovoltaic panels that should go on rooftops and parking lot shade structures in the built environment.

December 30, 2019 - Clark County Mojave Desert NV - The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has published a Notice of Availability in the Federal Register for the Proposed Resource Management Plan Amendment and Final Environmental Impact Statement analyzing the environmental impacts of the proposed Gemini Solar Project, to be located on BLM-administered land northeast of Las Vegas. If approved, the project would generate up to 690 megawatts of electricity but greatly impact the federally threatened Mojave desert tortoise.

Solar Partners, XI LLC (Arevia) proposes to construct, operate and eventually decommission the Gemini Solar Project, which consists of an approximately 690-megawatt alternating current solar photovoltaic power generating facility on roughly 7,100 acres of BLM administered land located about 33 miles northeast of Las Vegas and directly south of the Moapa River Indian Reservation. The Notice of Availability opens a 30-day protest period that will end on January 27, 2020.

The Hybrid (BLM Preferred) Alternative would involve solar development utilizing a combination of traditional development methods in solar array areas (scraping and grading the delicate biological soil crusts, creosote-bursage shrublands, big galleta grass patches, and desert willow/catclaw acacia microphyll woodlands on roughly 2,500 acres), and mowing on the remaining solar array areas (on approximately 4,600 acres). Mowing is a controversial method that still crushes and disturbes delicate soils and Mojave Desert vegetation, as well as crushing burrows and creating clouds of dust.

Basin and Range Watch will be protesting this badly-sited energy project, which blocks genetic connectivity between Mojave desert tortoise populations.

Associated Press mentions Basin and Range Watch such as in the Las Vegas Sun, about this project.

More >>here.

^"Mowed" creosote-bursage Mojave Desert vegeation at the utility-scale Sunshine Valley Solar Project just completed and in operation, Amargosa Valley, Nevada. This stripping and crushing of desert vegeation is not better than traditional methods of scraping and grading, and should not be considered as a "better way." December 2019. Will this be what 4,600-acres of Gemini Solar Project "mowed" solar project units look like? Rare milkvetches will not survive the trampling, crushing, truck traffic, construction machinery, heavy equipment, and 100% soil disturbance of this proposed project.

Filling Up Chuckwalla Valley Desert With Energy Sprawl

^The beautiful view in Chuckwalla Valley CA, before the bulldozers came and destroyed this scene. Desert Sunlight Solar Farm now occupies this landscape. More is to come unless we switch to smarter modern Distributed Energy Resources.

December 13, 2019 - Riverside County CA - The Field Office Reports of the California Desert Advisory Council December 2019 contain a lot of good information and news about the state of the California Desert, including off-road activity, grazing allotments, restoration activities, rare species conservation, high speed rail, and renewable energy updates.

Unfortunately, a new wave of solar project applications is descending on the Chuckwalla Valley, filling in more large-scale energy sprawl on the biodiverse desertpublic lands area in the Riverside East Solar Energy Zone. Already constructed across tens of throusands of acres of once remote and wildflower-filled desert, are Desert Sunlight Solar Farm, Desert Harvest, Genesis Solar Energy Project, and several utility-scale projects across Palo Verde Mesa near Blythe. The Palen Solar Project has been approved, but not yet under construction.

Solar Oversupply and Curtailments

This Mojave-Colorado Desert transition zone is the bullseye sacrifice zone for utility-scale solar development in the Southwest at the moment, despite the fact that current level of solar overgeneration in the desert exceeds to ability of the grid to absorb it, and therefore many large-scale solar projects such as Desert Sunlight, are regulaly "curtailed" or shut down by the California Independent System Operator.

The California Independent System Operator discusses the latest solar and wind overgeneration problem:

"The shift to a clean, efficient and modern grid is essential to California's economy and its environment. This transition to a low-carbon grid provides challenges and opportunities, as the state incorporates increasing amounts of renewable energy on to the electric system. Sometimes, during the middle of the day, California's renewable resources can generate more electricity than is needed.

"During these periods of surplus energy, the ISO's market automatically reduces the production of energy from renewable resources, or “curtail" generation. In rare instances, when economic bids from generators are insufficient, ISO operators manually curtail production to maintain the balance between supply and demand.

"While curtailment is an acceptable operational tool, as increasing amounts of renewable resources, oversupply conditions are expected to occur more often. The ISO is seeking solutions to avoid or reduce the amount of curtailment of renewable power to maximize the use of clean energy sources."

^Megawatt/hours of solar and wind projects switched off to balance the grid because of too much renewable energy at midday flooding the system. California Independent System Operator accessed December 13, 2019. It's getting worse. http://caiso.com/informed/pages/managingoversupply.aspx

The solution is advanced Distributed Energy Resources and microgrids, which can have the added benefit of reducing the need for more new fire-causing transmission lines across wildlands, and also sparing communities utility Planned Saftey Power Shutoffs. Basin and Range watch is working with the think tank Solar Done Right on a white paper about this modern smart alternative.

Wave of New Solar Projects

But without planning, more solar projects are proposed to be added into the mess.

See the new solar project applications >>here.

Northern Corridor Proposed Through Red Cliffs National Conservation Area, Utah

December 5, 2019 - St. George UT - A very bad precedent is being proposed to slash through high-value desert tortoise habitat in the beautiful Red Cliffs Preserve. Basin and Range Watch will be contributing comments, especially on visual resources, to help a coalition of groups that is opposing this project. Stay tuned for more.

Notice of Intent To Prepare an Environmental Impact Statement To Consider a Highway Right-of-Way With Associated Issuance of an Incidental Take Permit, and Resource Management Plan Amendments, Washington County, UT

Crimson Solar Project Public Meetings

^Desert ironwood groves around the base of the Mule Mountains, near Blythe CA in the Colorado Desert.

December 4, 2019 - We attended the December 2 public meeting in Palm Desert CA for the proposed Crimson Solar Project, and not a lot of people showed up despite the fact that this beautiful desert hold microphyll woodland and is near the Pacific Flyway route along the Colorado Desert. This proposed 2,500-acre photovoltaic project would lie on lands west of Blythe CA managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Hundreds of archaeology sites would be destroyed, as well as groves of desert ironwood and ocotillo. Mojave frige-toed lizards live here. The project would be built right next to the Mule Mountains Area of Critical Environmental Concern and be a visual disaster. Comments are due January 30, 2020. https://eplanning.blm.gov/epl-front-office/eplanning/planAndProjectSite.do?methodName=dispatchToPatternPage&currentPageId=131928

Trump Administration Set to Deconstruct the DRECP in January

December 4, 2019 - Basin and Range Watch had a conservation with staff of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) recently over the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan (DRECP), and we were told the changes should be coming in January 2020. BLM tells us that the size of Conservation Areas, such as Areas of Critical Environmental Concern, will not be reduced, but that the Conservation Management Actions (CMAs) will be weakened. This would most likely translate into increasing disturbance caps. Will utility-scale solar projects be allowed as long as the desert is "mowed", as is the current new mitigation trend? We do not support any weakening of Conservation Areas. More >>here.

US Fish and Wildlife Service Details Impacts to Desert Tortoise from Gemini Solar Project

^We found this large tortoise burrow on the proposed project footprint in October, 2019.

November 13, 2019 - The U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service sent us, upon request, the biological opinion for the large-scale Gemini Solar Project in northeastern Clark County, Nevada, which would impact the federally threatened Mojave desert tortoise (Gopherus agassizii) in accordance with section 7 of the Endangered Species Act of 1973. Analyzing this biological opinion, we see a slippery slope to extinction for the tortoise, however.

Desert Tortoise

The proposed Project will permanently impact approximately 4,511 acres of high-quality desert tortoise habitat and contribute towards the combined negative effects to the 47,420-acre recipient areas (short-distance and distant) as a result of translocation of all project tortoises. In other words, moving tortoises into the surrounding desert already occuppied by tortoises will result in increased competition, and mortality as tortoises seek new burrows for cover from heat and predators.

The biological opinion admits that death and injury of desert tortoises could result from excavation activities such as clearing and grubbing of vegetation; trenching activities and entrapment in open trenches and pipes; and collisions with or crushing by vehicles or heavy equipment, including individuals that take shelter under parked vehicles and are killed or injured when vehicles are moved. Desert tortoises that enter or attempt to cross project access roads may be struck resulting in death or injury. Mortality mechanisms also include individual desert` tortoises or their eggs being crushed or buried in burrows during construction and operating and maintenance activities. Because of increased human presence in the area, desert tortoises may be killed or injured due to collection or vandalism associated with increased encounters with workers, visitors, or unauthorized pets. Desert tortoises also may be attracted to the construction area by application of water to control dust, placing them at higher risk of death or injury. >>More here.

Military Legislative Push to Take Over Desert Bighorn Refuge Tries to Make End-Run Around Public Review Process

November 12, 2019 - Southern Nevada - The Department of Defense has lobbied heavily to use a large portion of the Desert National Wildlife Refuge in southern Nevada ‘primarily’ for military purposes, a newly-discovered draft bill says.

This draft legislation would carve out 1.1 million acres of Desert National Wildlife Refuge to be used only “secondarily” as a nature preserve, adding as much as 260,000 acres to the Air Force's test and training range. The push to expand has sparked fierce opposition from Moapa Band of Paiutes, whose ancestral lands extend across the testing range and refuge. Basin and Range Watch has been opposing this the military takeovers in Nevada from the beginning. We have not seen who is sponsoring this bill yet, and it has not been introduced.

Please contact your congressional representatives and tell them you oppose this bill! >>Senate. >>House of Representatives.

Read more at the Washington Post:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2019/11/03/pentagon-pushed-use-vast-swath-desert-wildlife-refuge-primarily-military-purposes-draft-bill-says/

Read more about Nevada military expansion proposals.

Developer Pushing Canceled Application for Crescent Peak Wind Project Next to Wee Thump Wilderness

^Simulation of industrial wind project next to Wee Thump Joshua Tree Wilderness, with Crescent Peak in the distance.

November 4, 2019 - Searchlight NV - A new application for the Crescent Peak Wind Project is being pushed by the Swedish company Eolus, despite a letter on November 19, 2018, from the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Assistant Secretary of Land and Minerals Management stating that this application could not be processed due to non-conformance with the approved Las Vegas Resource Management Plan (RMP) and it conflicts with resource uses, military training missions, and county development. Subsequent to this the local Las Vegas BLM office sent Eolus a letter rejecting the application and closing the casefile for this wind project right-of-way application.

A more strongly-worded and clear rejection of this wind project in any form could not be more obvious, while accepting the very high value of natural and recreational resources in this region that need added protection. We have been advocating for a wind energy-free zone from Lake Mead National Recreation Area to the california border across this southern tip of Nevada for years, in order to protect the Piute Valley, Wee Thump area, Spirit Mountain viewshed, and Walking Box Ranch region in perpetuity for the public.

We have obtained files in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request showing the revised mitigation plans and updated application, as well as emails between agency staff telling everyone to withold information from Basin and Range Watch represented by co-founder and director Kevin Emmerich (which should be publicly available). Think what the federal agencies are witholding on oil and gas public lands leases and projects.

We also Received a FOIA request that included a revised Plan of Development (POD) from August 2019, after the Interior Secretary's office had sent the wind company a letter to cancel the project. Eolus seems to not take the letter at its face value, and is trying to push to build an industrial wind project in this high value public lands area anyway.

The wind company claims it would reduce impacts to Wee Thump Joshua Tree Wilderness Area in a letter to the Nevada Public Utilities Commission (obtained in a FOIA request), yet its recent maps show wind turbine generators surrounding two side of the Wilderness, up to its boundary, as well as a new 24-mile long 230-kiloVolt transmission line gen-tie through the Joshua tree savanna. Each wind turbine generator would be 599 feet high, and impact the rare gilded flicker populations here, as well as many other birds only found in Nevada in this Mojave desert grassland-Joshua tree savanna. Maps and more >>here.

Crimson Solar Project Draft Environmental Impact Statement Out

November 1, 2019 - Blythe CA - In eastern Riverside County the beautiful California Desert has another proposal to carve up delicate ecosystems and do harm to rare wildlife species. This utility-scale solar project would be 2,500 acres on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management next to their pending 3,800-acre Desert Quartzite Solar Project making about 6,300 acres of good quality California Desert habitat the latest sacrifice. Cultural sites, Mule Mountains Area of Critical Environmental Concern, Bradshaw Trail, desert pavements, biological soil crust, burrowing owls, Mojave fringe-toed lizards, tortoise, will all be impacted. See more on the Crimson Solar Project >>here.

This is in the East Riverside Solar Zone and Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan (DRECP) Development Focus Area. The pending November dicing of the DRECP will now most likely help these developers in the protected areas.

See the information here:

https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-seeks-public-comment-proposed-crimson-solar-project?fbclid=IwAR3M9YuQNCHy0lHuYNzC6xNCq8mlbSrh3CWHgk4aJxg8NxQGaJRKRBYk40Y

Map: https://eplanning.blm.gov/epl-front-office/projects/nepa/88925/142202/174606/Crimson_Project_Location_508.pdf

Basin and Range Watch is working with the think tank Solar Done Right to develop an advanced Distributed Energy Resource plan to bring positive solutions to fighting climate change with local microgrids and local solar power and storage. Stay tuned. These remote desert utility-scale power plants attached to long high-voltage transmission lines are a 20th Century form of energy, and we beleive the 21st Century needs to move forward. The bonus for California would be less wildfire-sparking transmission lines stretching hundreds of miles across wildlands.

Gemini Solar Project Applicant Seeking Fast-Track Outside of Public Review

October 18, 2019 - Clark County NV - Basin and Range Watch put pressure on the Nevada state office of Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to not allow the company seeking to build the 11-square-mile photovoltaic solar project on public lands to place more meteorological towers and road construction before the project is approved.

The Mojave Desert here has many sensitive resources, including rare plants, a dense desert tortoise population, sand habitats, microphyll scrub communities, desert washes, and the Old Spanish Trail. We saw a Crissal thrasher run across one sandy wash lined with catclaw acacias and desert willows--both turning fall colors.

Arevia, trying to get much-needed tax breaks, tried to rush building roads, MET towers, and grading on a portion of the project in order to fulfill terms of the tax incentive by a certain deadline. But BLM pushed back (with nudging from us), that this would be illegal under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). BLM issued this letter. More >>here.

High Desert Corridor Freeway Halted

October 6, 2019 - We are happy to pass on the news from the Los Angeles Times that the West Mojave Desert Los Angeles County and San Bernardino County proposal for a giant freeway from Lancaster to Victorville and Apple Valley has been on hold indefinitely. A lack of funding an a lawsuit did the project in. We wrote comments on this, opposing it for a number of reasons.

The freeway originally also included a high-speed rail along with the freeway, as well as solar energy panels along the sides of the wide right-ofway. The sprawling freeway project would include eight lanes, and bulldoze through Joshua tree woodland, desert vernal pools, tortoise habitat, and areas where rare Coast hormed lizards (Phrynosoma coronatum) come down from the San Gabriel Mountains into the Mojave Desert. In addition, the freeway and rail line would cross over the Mojave River in areas where riparian birds nest--Western yellow-billed cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus) and others.

Plus, towns and communities would have been greatly impacted, including a very large number of eminent domains of houses and farmland proposed. And of course climate change impacts would be large, from a new freeway with high-speed traffic replacing a country lane.

The high speed rail element, however, may be allowed to continue, and funding could be used from Measure M to build it. Therefore desert defenders should still be vigilant in watching for eminent domain and a rail project through senstive desert resources.

NV Energy Terminates Power Purchase Agreement for Crescent Dunes Solar Power Tower

October 6, 2019 - Tonopah NV - The utility NV Energy, we discovered, had given a 6 month notice to the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project in January 2019, for failure to supply the power generation agreed to. Several news sources reported that NV Energy has terminated the contract to buy power from the troubled solar project.

Basin and Range Watch has been following this power tower from the beginning, visiting the site before it was built, and commenting on the envieonmental impacts the project had. We even won a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit againts the local Bureau of Land Management file office for failure to produce videos showing birds singed and pyrolizing in the solar flux.

The solar power tower has been offline for months at a time lately, as we drive by and look. Rumors abound about the breaks and and leaks in pipes and the super-heated molten salt tanks.

This is a setback for utility-scale storage technologies that would help balance the grid due to overgeneration of solar energy during peak times. Another reason we support advanced Distributed Energy Resources in the build environment.

Bloomberg reported that the Department of Energy (DOE) may be trying to take over the solar power plant. Solar Reserev received a generous $730 million loan guanantee. We predict this solar power tower will be taken over by DOE and used as some sort of experimental renewable energy plant in the future.

Final Environmental Impact Statement Released for Desert Quartzite Solar Project

^The Mule Mountains in the distance, looking across the Colorado Desert with diverse microphyll woodland and creosote desert, part of which would be developed for a utiloity-scale solar project.

September 26, 2019 - Blythe CA - The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) announced today the release of their Final Environmental Impact Statement and Environmental Impact Report (EIS/EIR) and California Desert Conservation Area Land Use Plan Amendment for the Desert Quartzite Solar Project in eastern Riverside County.

The publication of the Notice of Availability in the Federal Register opens a 30-day protest period and a 60-day governor’s consistency review.

The project would generate up to 450 megawatts, and cost $1 billion to construct.

But as usual, nothing has been learned in the last 10 years concerning "Smart from the Start" energy siting. This lies on beautiful, biodiverse Colorado Desert with Mojave fringe-toed lizards, diverse desert birds, rare desert-adapted mule deer, and micropyhyll tree woodlands on public lands near Blythe and close to the Colorado River.

Plus, the Mule Mountains are sacred to many tribal groups in the area, and we have talked with tribal members who have said no energy development should happen in this region. Apparently Environmental Justice only matters when fossil fuel energy is involved, but when large-scale solar energy is involved in resource destruction, people look the other way.

Interestingly the BLM preferred a "Resource Aviodance Alternative" which would be 2,833 acres. It would have the same 450 MW output. BLM said in its EIS:

"Resource Avoidance Alternative was developed to specifically reduce impacts to cultural and biological resources, as well as drainages and watercourses. In general, the alternative would avoid the drainages and sand dunes in the northwestern portion of the Project area, as well as resources in the southwestern portion of the Project area. This alternative further provides a buffer between the project and avoided resources in most instances."

A "Reduced Project Alternative further reduces the acreage of the solar arrays, with elimination of the proposed solar arrays primarily in the northern portion of the area to maintain habitat for the Mojave fringe-toed lizard and Harwood’s eriastrum, a BLM Sensitive Species plant." This alternative was not chosen, however.

Yet a larger 3,770-acre project is now the proposed project.

The Palo Verde Mesa and Chuckwalla Valley have taken the brunt of so-called renewable energy development in the last 10 years, as public lands wildlife habitat is gobbled up for mega-power plants.

To fight climate change we are supposed to plant trees and protect their carbon-sequestration abilities. Yet the proposed Desert Quartzite Solar Project would bulldoze and destroy palo verde trees, desert ironwood, and smoke trees.

^Desert ironwood (Olneya tesota) next to the Mule Mountains. This will be detroyed for a utility-scale solar project? How much carbon will be released? Do desert trees not matter?

See more photos we took from the same area, when the Rio Mesa solar power tower project was proposed several years ago (and withdrawn because the area held a vital Cultural Landscape and dense paleontological resources).

See the BLM news release here:

https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-releases-desert-quartzite-solar-project-final-environmental-analysis

Crescent Peak Wind Zombie Project?

^Chairwoman Ann Pongracz of the Nevada Public Utilities Commission, at the preheraing conference.

August 11, 2019 - Las Vegas NV - Basin and Range Watch learned that the applicant for the Crescent Peak Wind Project, the Swedish company Eolus, may be trying to bring the project back from the dead.

In 2018, then-Interior Secretary Zinke had written a letter instructing the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to cancel the project, due to significant environmental and recreational concerns in the Castle Mountains region of southern Nevada, where the large wind project was proposed. The wind turbines were slated to be constructed in unique Mojave Desert grasslands and Joshua tree woodlands next to the California border, alongside Mojave National Preserve and the new Castle Mountains National Monument.

We learned that Eolus and their attorney had scheduled a prehearing conference on August 6 before the Nevada Public Utility Commission (PUC) to argue the procedural process of continuing their application. We were there are observers, and Basin and Range watch was entered into the administrative record as "present."

Attorney Linda Bullen, representing the wind company, videoed in from Reno, along with a representative of Eolus.

Bullen asked for a closed prehearing because of the purported confidentiality of certain information in the application. The staff atttorney representing the PUC, Shelley Cassidy, said she had seen this material, and it did not warrant confidential status. It would be in the public interest to see this material openly. Bullen countered that the information was confidential business information, and "ongoing disussions." Cassidy came back that the information was not claimed as privileged or trade secrets, and based on their legal analysis it was not confidential.

Commissioner Pongracz said she would make a determination on this in the next few days.

Cassidy argued that Secretarial letter of August 19, 2018, denying the wind project, was indeeded a final agency action. Therefore the case was closed. She also called BLM to clarify, and the Las Vegas office told the PUC that they did not intend to issue anything further, the denial order "came from the boss." So there was nothing further that the BLM could issue.

Linda Bullen, however, repeatedly argued that the letter did not terminate the wind project, there was no direct communication from BLM to them.

Chairwoman Pongracz asked if Bullen had viewed the BLM web page on the project update that says BLM is denying the Right of Way for the wind project?

This BLM eplanning page reads: Project Status, Project Update:

The BLM is denying the right-of-way application made by Crescent Peak Renewables LLC for the proposed Crescent Peak Wind project near Searchlight, Nevada. The BLM had previously determined that the proposed project would not conform with the Las Vegas Resource Management Plan – a conflict that in many cases results in immediate rejection of project proposals. Nonetheless, the agency conducted a significant public scoping process and engaged a number of cooperators, including Federal, county, and state governments, to provide information on potential project impacts. This review, however, identified multiple issues and concerns that prompted the agency’s decision to deny the application.

These issues include that access to the turbines would potentially affect the development of more than 300 mining claims; the turbines could interfere with radar at two regional air facilities – one military and one civilian; and impacts to the visual landscape.

Linda Bullen responded that this posting does not reflect the project. She did not think the Zinke letter represented a final agency action. When asked by the PUC if Eolus planned to legally challenge this, Bullen said no, they were not.

Counsel for the PUC Cassidy pushed to have the Crescent Peak Wind Project application dismissed. She said already 9 months had passed since the Interior letter. Linda Bullen requested 3 more months, to try to find clarification from the Department of Interior apparently. Cassidy wanted a stipulation that if no such information was forthcoming by the end of 3 months, that the applicant would agree to automtaically withdraw and end this case. Bullen agreed.

Commissioner Pongracz, listening carefully to the legal arguments, decided to have a hearing on November 5, 2019, to hear any testimony about whether this project should be dismissed. Attorney Cassidy pushed fro immediate dismissal, but said she would agree to 3 more months. She said she not need to provide any testimony, and that that this application dismissal would be solely as a legal argument. Attorney Bullen for Eolus said she might need to provide testimony. But she also said that if the environmental review process was not re-initiated by that time, then they would withdraw.

Panamint Valley Lithium Exploration Project Approved

August 11, 2018 - Inyo County CA - The Bureau of Land Management on August 9 authorizesd Battery Minerals Resources California Inc. to drill at four exploration sites on mining claims adjacent to designated roads.

In June, the Trump Administration released, “A Federal Strategy to Ensure a Reliable Supply of Critical Minerals,” to make America’s economy and defense more secure. The strategy directs the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) to locate domestic supplies of those minerals, ensure access to information necessary for the study and production of minerals, and expedite permitting for minerals projects. This project is consistent with the strategy and with Executive and Secretary's orders for critical mineral commodities by attempting to locate lithium from federal lands.

Lithium is as a component of high energy-density rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. Lithium consumption for batteries has increased significantly in recent years because rechargeable lithium batteries are used extensively in the growing market for portable electronic devices and in electric tools, electric vehicles, and grid storage applications.

We support Lithium batteries but extraction should only take place at sites with the least environmental consquences. Panamint Valley lies alongisde the Panamint Mountains and next to the boundary of Death Valley National Park.

If commercial quantities of Lithium are found here, the impacts could balloon to significant levels as extraction of Lithium requires large evaporation lakes where groundwater is pumped to form brines. Clayton Valley to the north in Nevada is one of the few active large-scale Lithium mining operations in North America, and it has expanded in the last several years.

The environmental assessment and the Decision Record are available at ePlanning.

^Largescale brine lakes evaporating Lithium salts at industrial site in Clayton Valley, Nevada. This is all pumped groundwater.

The Swamp is Alive and Well in Nevada

July 27, 2019 - Las Vegas, NV - At one of the public meetings for the Gemini Solar Project, we met Nevada State Senator Chris Brooks. But he quickly told us that he was just Chris Brooks that night and not Senator Brooks. That is because he owns a company called Brooks Consulting and told us he has a personal involvement with Gemini Solar. Gemini Solar received a Power Purchase Agreement with NV Energy in late June. As Senator Brooks, he introduced the 50 Percent Nevada Renewable Portfolio Standard bill for Nevada which passed in March and was signed into law. This requires Nevada utilities to acquire 50 percent of their energy from Renewable sources by 2030. How interesting that a solar project he is involved in is the first to profit off the 50 percent RPS legislation.

Gemini Solar Project is owned by Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners' Low Carbon Power Fund. But what is not factored into this investment in renewable energy is that the project that will have long-term environmental issues and is not needed in this location to fight climate change. The significant harm to the Mojave Desert ecosystem here, desert tortoises, rare plants, recreation, and carbon storage in the desert soils and vegetation is not being valued. A few will profit, and our public lands will be degraded and closed off here.

^The federally threatened Mojave desert tortoise continues to decline.

Arevia Power and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) claim that mowing vegetation – as opposed to using traditional bulldozing and grading methods – on the site of its proposed Gemini Solar Project northeast of Las Vegas will allow the solar project site to double as suitable tortoise habitat. Biologists and botanists familiar with tortoise habitat requirements and the likely impacts of construction on the tortoise’s primary food sources assess that the company’s and BLM’s claims are wrong and underestimate the project’s impacts on wildlife.

The BLM is seeking public comment on a plan to build the Gemini Solar project across 11 square miles of desert habitat just outside of Valley of Fire State Park. The plans call for using an unproven mowing technique on seven square miles of the project site, and the traditional “disc and roll” clearing of the desert on the remaining four square miles. The BLM’s environmental analysis claims that the company will be able to reintroduce desert tortoises to the mowed area once the solar panels have been installed.

In order to mow the vegetation across seven square miles, the company would use heavy equipment to cut existing vegetation down to 18 inches. The BLM’s environmental analysis acknowledges that this process will also result in desert plants being crushed by heavy equipment. Crews will then pound in thousands of steel posts with pile-drivers that will hold panels, and use ditch diggers to install collector lines all across the site. Miles of new access roads and utility corridors would also have to be constructed.

^This is the proposed Gemini Solar Site, which includes croesote, bursage, and washes with catclaw acacia and desert willow.

The ground disturbing activities that Arevia Power proposes also bring another risk – the proliferation of nonnative weeds that outcompete native plants. Weeds such as red brome and cheatgrass provide little or no nutrients to tortoises, but they can spread rapidly across soils disturbed by construction activities. The BLM’s environmental analysis proposes weed management activities that involve spraying herbicide across the project site, but that will require more trampling of desert plants and compaction of soils, leading to a cycle of habitat degradation. Also, herbicides can kill off beneficial native plants.

The Gemini Solar project is expected to displace as many as 260 desert tortoises, and also impact one of the few remaining populations of the threecorner milkvetch, a desert plant listed as critically imperiled in Nevada. Tortoises that are relocated to neighboring habitat often face an uphill battle for survival, removed from their network of burrows. At the nearby Moapa Solar power project, ten tortoises died within a year of being displaced, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. A study by the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute also found that relocated tortoises reproduce at a significantly lower rate.

The new questionable idea is to now take down the fences surrounding the solar fields after a while, and let tortoises re-enter the construction site. A board member of the Desert Tortoise Council was at the meeting, and told us they are looking for a way to build utility-scale solar projects without blocking tortoise connectivity across the landscape. But instead of scientifically testing and collecting evidence on the efficacy of smaller projects that mow desert vegetation and allow tortoises to re-enter--such as the Pahrump Valley Solar Project--the agencies are forging ahead with a giagantic experiment to mow thousands of acres of Mojave Desert Scrub and microphyll woodland, and see if tortoises do not suffer high mortality. Unfortunately the Desert Tortoise Council and many environmental organizations support this blind experiment on a large scale.

The area around the project site has a high density of tortoises. BLM says that the success of reintroduction to mowed areas is unknown. US Fish and Wildlife Service guidance does not allow short-distance translocation into higher tortoise density sites. Contradictions and questions abound with this project.

The latest plan is to translocate one of four big clusters of tortoises to he old desert tortoise conservation center in Las Vegas and hold them there for one year. When the vegetation grows back at the project site, the fence will be removed and the tortoises will be released back on the site. This is quite a lot of new transportation for these reptiles.

Also, the mowed alternative seems to now be the "reduced acreage" alternative. This is not a viable alternative since it appears to be experimental, and no one knows if the mowed project is going to provide viable habitat.

^A telephoto lens captues the mowed desert underneath thousands of reflective photovoltaic panels on Sunshine Valley Solar Project, under construction in Amargosa Valley, Nevada. The tall creosote shrub in the foreground used to cover the valley floor here, but was mowed, then posts pile-drived into the ground to mount solar panels on. This is a huge disturbance to the native Mojave Desert ecosystem.

We have to roll out solar energy without exacerbating the extinction crisis, and use much more renewable energy in already disturbed areas and in the built environment. More photos on our Gemini Solar Project page.

Public Meetings for Gemini Solar Project

July 21, 2019 - Please speak up for the desert and out public lands at a meeting or in writing to the Bureau of Land Management, to oppose the ill-sited sprawling Gemini Solar Project next to the Muddy Mountains Wilderness Area, Nevada.

Las Vegas
When: Tuesday, July 23rd, 5:00 - 8:00 PM
Where: Suncoast Hotel and Casino, 9090 Alta Dr, Las Vegas, NV 89145

Moapa
When: Wednesday, July 24th, 5:30 - 8:30 PM
Where: Moapa Community Center, 1340 East State Highway 168, Moapa, NV 89025

Thank you to our colleague at Mojave Desert Blog for posting about this ill-sited project. An excerpt:

Mowing or Bulldozing?

Perhaps the most absurd aspect of the Gemini Solar Project proposal is that the company promises to reduce impacts on wildlife by mowing vegetation on part of the site. This proposal is a public relations stunt, not a scientifically sound method to preserve habitat. Of the 11 square miles that Arevia Power plans to use for the Gemini Solar project, 7 square miles will be mowed and the remaining 4 square miles will be bulldozed. Plants could be mowed down to 18 or 24 inches, according to the BLM's environmental analysis, and that would require tractors driving across much of the site. This means that not only will plants be cut down or crushed by the vehicles, the soils will be compacted.

The developer wishfully promises that desert tortoises can again use the area where vegetation was mowed, but ignores the fact that after driving vehicles back-and-forth across 7 square miles of fragile desert habitat, cutting and crushing plants, tortoises will be left with a severely degraded landscape. Soil compaction will make it difficult for desert plants to grow back, depriving tortoises of a food source. All of this disturbance by vehicles will also increase the likelihood that non-native weeds take root. Non-native plants - such as red brome and Sahara mustard - not only lack nutrients that tortoises need to survive, they also pose a fire hazard. (Mojave Desert Blog)

And see our page on the mowed desert at Pahrump Valley Solar Project for how this will likely appear. This is not restoration of a desert ecosystem, but disturbing it and industrializing it.

The better alternative to ruining our public lands and tortoise habitat: parking lot solar structures in urban areas.

https://fairfaxnews.com/2019/07/metro-plans-solar-farms-on-rooftop-parking-lots/?fbclid=IwAR046ntP-_NUbKwakEytm3tLQrdU6EsxBRRQcQeN6Te_oEaIyYb0DqHd42I

Great Basin Fuel Breaks

July 21, 2019 - On June 21, the Bureau of Land Management released the Draft Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for Fuel Breaks in the Great Basin for a 45-day public comment period. This Draft Programmatic EIS analyzes a system of up to 11,000 miles of strategically placed fuel breaks to control wildfires within a 223 million-acre area that includes portions of Idaho, Oregon, Washington, California, Nevada and Utah.

The preferred alternative identified in the Draft Programmatic EIS would create up to 11,000 miles of new fuel breaks within a 223 million-acre area that includes portions of Idaho, Oregon, Washington, California, Nevada and Utah. Fuel breaks would be reseeded, using both native and non-native plant species throughout the project area.

Tools used to create fuel breaks could include brown strips - areas where all vegetation has been removed; green strips - areas where vegetation that is more flammable has been replaced with less flammable vegetation; and mowing or targeted grazing depending on the locations and vegetation.

We oppose this since climate-driven extreme winds blow sparks across huge swaths of land, and over firebreaks. A system of planned wildfire would be better in order to mimic the natural fire regime of Great Basin plant communities.

Draft Environmental Impact Statement Out for Gemini Solar Project

June 7, 2018 - The Environmental Impact Statement for the Gemini Solar Project on Bureau of Land Management lands in southern Nevada was released today. The project will potentially be ten square miles (7,100 acres) and nearly 300 Threatened desert tortoise will need too be excavated and moved. The project will be built on the Valley of Fire Entrance Road by the Muddy Mountains Wilderness Area. It will remove rare plant habitat and cover part of the Old Spanish Trail.

More >>here.

Owens Valley Pumped Hydro Project

^New renewable energy targets: Wheeler Ridge (to the right of Mt. Tom) at sunset near Tom's Place and above Bishop CA.

UPDATE June 7, 2019 -- The project application was thrown out by the Federal Energy Regulatory Project as being several "projects" that each needed a permit. The developer has now switched to a pumped hydro storage project east of Highway 395 in the White Mountains, Inyo County CA. Wyman Canyon and Birch Creek are now targets with reservoirs proposed at 8,000 to 10,000 feet elevation.

More on this next week.

May 13, 2019 - Eastern Sierra - A surprisingly badly-sited renewable energy project appeared in the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) initial application process for a license. A series of dams on the scenic Owens River and in the Rock Creek area of the Sierra Nevada--including Wheeler Ridge where a herd of rare Sierra Nevada bighorn sheep (which is federally endangered and California state endangered)--and pipelines would hold a series of reservoirs in Owens Gorge and up on Wheeler Ridge. Excess energy produced by intermittent utility-scale wind projects and solar projects could be used to pump water uphill. Then when energy is needed the water would be released to flow down the east slope of the Sierra to lower reservoirs. Download the project proposal PDF.

Large-scale solar projects in the desert have a growing overgeneration problem during midday, and these kinds of projects will be proposed more and more to soak up some of that : the Eagle Mountain Pumped Storage Project, but it has not yet been built.

The project would be next to the boundary of the John Muir Wilderness Area. New large, long high-voltage transmission lines will be needed to serve Los Angeles.

(Images courtesy California Department of Fish and Wildlife)

According tto California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Wheeler Ridge is a population that was intially reestablished in 1982 with 15 ewes. Over the past 35 years the population has grown to over 100 individuals. The Wheeler herd was productive enough to provide source stock for a natural colonization of the Convict Creek herd to the north in about 2009 as well as 11 ewes for translocation to start the Cathedral herd in 2016.

See https://elibrary.ferc.gov/idmws/search/fercgensearch.asp and https://elibrary.ferc.gov/idmws/docket_search.asp

Enter Docket Number P-14984.

Basin and Range Watch will be opposing this horrendous project, and continuing to support better renewable energy alternatives involving Distributed Energy Resources in the built environment.

See the article in the San Francisco Chronicle:

https://www.sfchronicle.com/science/article/New-dam-proposal-in-Sierra-Nevada-stirs-debate-13839661.php

Pahrump Valley Solar Project: Does Mitigation Work?

May 9, 2019 - Pahrump NV - Is this a beautiful desert scene you would like to hike in? Does this landscape conserve habitat for biodiversity and rare plant and animal species? Would rooftops be the better option for these solar panels?

We took a hard look at one of the utility-scale solar projects that was built as the best "state-of-the-art" "smart from the start" "environmentally friendly" and mitigated projects out there. Environmental groups worked with Valley Electric Inc., the local utility, to try to mitigate desert tortoise habitat and avian-solar mortality issues (where the photovoltaic panels imitate lakes and birds smash into them and die). Many much larger solar projects (such as the Gemini Solar Project over 7,000 acres) will be looking to try to copy these designs, in the hopes of mitigating environmental impacts.

But we are not convinced. More >>here.

Desert Hydrology Block Diagram

March 31, 2019 - This classic block diagram by a Basin and Range Watch co-founder is going viral on social media. Pen and ink with colored pencil, this illustrates basic generalized hydrology of aquifers and springs in the Mojave Desert of California, Nevada, and Arizona. We have commented on hundreds of environmental review documents over the past 10 years where poorly-sited large-scale solar projects (especially concentrated solar thermal technologies) have proposed groundwater pumping that over the years will cause cones of depression. Large gold and lithium mines will cause groundwater impacts as well. And bad projects such as the Cadiz water storage project would also similarly impact desert aquifers.

A large portion of that blue aquifer is actually "fossil water" -- water deposited tens of thousands of years ago during Ice Ages when conditions were much wetter in the Southwest deserts, and groundwater recharge was at a maximum.

Today groundwater recharge from rainfall is minimal, and we need to minimize pumping and groundwater depletion in our precious deserts.

This was meant as a simple illustration to educate kids on field trips to the desert from urban areas, organized by friends. But as one of our board members pointed out, simplifying science down to the kindergarten level can be highly benefifical to educating adults as well.

Art? Or Off-Roading in the Coachella Valley Desert

March 24, 2019 - Palm Desert - This special report by Ruth Nolan, long-time desert resident and professor at College of the Desert. See the full story with photos >>here.

Lithium Exploration in Panamint Valley

^Lithium extraction lakes in Clayton Valley, Nevada at Silver Peak. (Photo courtesy Wikipedia Commons)

March 16, 2019 - Panamint Valley, California Desert - As we have been expecting, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has released an Environmental Assessment (EA) for lithium exploration in Panamint Valley. While lithium exploration on playas is highly speculative, we can all agree that the idea of a huge lithium extraction project in Panamint Valley would be a very bad idea next to Death Valley National Park. But BLM is considering it. Comments due April 15th.

This is a designated National Conservation Land under the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan (DRECP), with a 1% development cap. This equates to about 200 acres allowable for surface disturbance, far below what an operating lithium extraction process would need to be profitable--with wells pumping groundwater to evaporate vast acreages of salts in a playa pool to yeild lithuim in commercial quantities. And few playas in Nevada and California have produced lithium concentrations that make capital investments worthwhile. So this may be simply speculative test drilling. More >>here.

https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-seeks-public-comment-panamint-valley-exploratory-drilling-project-inyo-county

BREAKING: Sandstone Solar Power Tower Project Application Withdrawn

March 4, 2019 - Tonopah NV - We suspected something was up when Kevin Smith, CEO of SolarReserve resigned from the company he founded.

This, after years of cost overruns, bursting pipes and welding seams, and other porblems on the massive Crescent Dunes solar power tower that uses molten salt through its entire system: from tower reciever heated by solar energy, to the two molten salt tanks where this heat energy is transferred to conventional water-steam turbines to generate electricity for the gird.

SolarReserve had banked on infrastructure funding, or some other federal subsidy, to build it's proposed super-massive ten additional solar power towers on public land adjacent to the Crescent Dunes Solar Project. This was proposed as the Sandstone Solar Project.

Smith was an original power tower engineer from the 1980s. He jumped ship to work with the fossil fuel company BP's solar arm, Lightsource BP. Which developes photovoltaic solar projects--not a good recommendation for Concentrated Solar Thermal technology.

We have been closely tracking this project, to the point of sending in numerous Freedom of Information Act requests, since the existing project has been controversial in the number of bird kills due to its intense solar flux.

Today, after an inquiry, the Bureau of Land Management confirmed to us in an email that the Sandstone Solar Project had withdrawn its application. No details were provided.

This will have major implications for any future renewable energy portfolio standard and New Green Deal, as hopes pinned on storing energy generated from solar power on expensive and problem-ridden molten salt tanks built to larger scale have suffered a setback today.

We support renewable energy in the built environment, on rooftops, over parking lots, and using battery storage paired with photovoltaic panels. Not utility-cale energy sprawl on high-value public lands.

More >>here.

Gemini Solar Project Will Block Crucial Linkage Corridor for Tortoise

^Desert tortoise (Gopherus aggasizii) dining on beavertail cactus.

March 3, 2019 - California Wash, NV - A "good experiment"?

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is saying that the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Gemini Solar Project will be released at the end of this month. This will be a 7,000 acre (10 Square Mile) photovoltaic project located on the entrance road to Valley of Fire State Park in Southern Nevada. Aside from being a very scenic area (next to the Muddy Mountains Wilderness) they have estimated that over 260 desert tortoises will need to be excavated and relocated to make way for the project. There has never been a 100 percent success moving tortoises like this at this scale. There will be mortality. The US Fish and Wildlife Service has said this project along with other pressures will fragment a crucial linkage corridor connecting desert tortoise recovery units. But the same folks have told me that they will suggest "mowing vegetation" and allowing tortoises to enter the site. They are not opposing it, but actually told us that would be a "good experiment " The desert tortoise has declined by over 50 percent since 2008. Also found were 99 active kit fox burrows and 14 active burrowing owl burrows. More on the project here:

https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-seeks-comments-gemini-solar-project-near-las-vegas?fbclid=IwAR3o3uUZmFQ-CzlNJuqBUUUQ6ZGRVK2dfhS_Y2cjWV1q6YHBj9yWia_3oQ0

^Map of proposed Gemini Solar Project in high quality desert tortoise habitat.

^Mojave Desert Tortoise habitat and linkages. The blue areas are crucial genetic connectivity corridors, and the Gemini Solar Project would block one connecting Recovery Units. From a February 27

^High quality desert tortoise habitat at the proposed Gemini Solar Project site in California Wash, with the Muddy Mountains Wilderness Area in the distance.

Moving Yellow Pine Solar Project to North Side of Tecopa Highway Will NOT Lessen Impacts to Desert Tortoise

^New map of the project, moved to the north side of the Tecopa Highway where we found a desert tortoise.

March 3, 2019 - Pahrump Valley NV - The Bureau of Land Management will release the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Yellow Pine Solar Project in mid-April. This will be a 3,000 acre photovoltaic project located in the South Pahrump Valley, Nevada on pristine, Mojave Desert habitat for rooftop friendly solar panels. It is very good desert tortoise habitat. Combined with the proposed Gemini Solar Project to the south, the BLM is about to approve the removal of 10,000 acres of desert tortoise habitat. The region is recovering from a drought, so the tortoise count is not as high as Gemini. They found 53 on the survey. But the US Fish and Wildlife Service has identified the site as one of the last important in tact desert tortoise connectivity sites in the Mojave Desert. A 4.6 square mile solar project will change this. The BLM tells us that all Joshua trees and Mojave yuccas on the site will be shredded and mulched. The original application was 9,000 acres. The project will be built right next to a new desert tortoise translocation area. This area was put aside to relocate tortoises from other development projects. The project will be built next to and be visible from the Old Spanish Trail. The BLM and one environmental organization are trying to spin this by saying the habitat is not as important on the NW side of Tecopa Road. Trust us - that is bullshit. More information here:

https://www.blm.gov/press-release/blm-seeks-comments-yellow-pine-solar-project-near-pahrump?fbclid=IwAR0ONIiE11b_vOMa3ValDF3HoLSmiAy-_CfXHnTHiATDWcvbjxuxDW0c9kU

^Large healthy desert tortoise in its burrow on the north side of the Tecopa Highway, where several environmental organizations are accepting "mitigating" the project impacts by moving the solar field to this side. We are not all right with moving the solar project to the north side of the highway, as this desert tortoise will now have to be dug out of this burrow and transloacted somewhere else, risking mrotality from predation or hyperthermia.

^The richly biodiverse Mojave Desert scrub below the Spring Range, with Mojave yuccas. This is the north side of the Yellow Pine Project, where many stakeholders have agreed to move the project to "lessen impacts." We disagree that impacts will be lessened, and oppose any part of this desert being bulldozed.

San Bernardino County Votes to Uphold Utility-scale Solar Ban in Rural Deserts

^Desert dandelions near the Granite Mountains and Lucerne Valley.

February 28, 2019 - San Bernardino County CA - Great news! Local residents, voters, and tax-payers let their supervisors know loudly and clearly at a special hearing that they value the desert ecosystems, wildlands, wildflower fileds, Joshua tree woddlands, scenic vistas, and quality of life of their rural and local communities. Not industrial utility-scale solar projects which bulldoze thousands of acres.

Huge numbers of ocal residents spoke in support of the proposed ban, known as Renewable Energy Policy 4.10, which would have allowed large-scale solar developments to be built in rural county lands and unincorporated areas.

The policy is part of the broader Renewable Energy and Conservation Element (RECE) in the county’s General Plan. Policy 4.10 would minimize the impact on desert residents by prohibiting utility-scale renewable energy developments in zones designated as rural living, and the communities of Bloomington, Muscoy, Bear Valley, Crest Forest, Hilltop, Lake Arrowhead, Lytle Creek, Oak Glen, Homestead Valley, Joshua Tree, Lucerne Valley, Morongo Valley, Oak Hills and Phelan/Phelan Hills. Developers could still build on land previously used for mining or agriculture.

Unfortunately, more remote desert areas in Amboy, El Mirage, Hinkley, Kramer Junction and Trona do not get such a ban. Kramer Junction has high-value desert tortoise habitat, as well as a newly-discovered population of Mohave ground squirrels. Trona has scenic Pinnacles used in Hollywood movies. And allowing indutrial energy development around Hinckley, on top of groundwater pollution problems, is an Environmental Justice issue.

Yet developers told the supervisors this was "too restrictive."

Residents strongly supported rooftop solar and Distributed Energy Resources that do not harm the quality of life, nor create dust storms.

Supervisor Robert Lovingood said residents “spoke clearly about what they want to see."fv4rf 4vv!

Los Angeles Times: https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-san-bernardino-solar-renewable-energy-20190228-story.html

Background:

The Sun: https://www.sbsun.com/2019/02/22/san-bernardino-county-board-of-supervisors-to-consider-guidelines-for-renewable-energy-development-in-the-desert/

See more >>here.

Wildfire Dangers of High-Voltage Transmission Lines

^High-voltage transmission lines near Jacumba in the eastern San Diego backcountry.

January 28, 2019 - We have supported better Distributed Energy Resources and policy for ten years now, as the better alternative to bulldozing desert ecosystems and public lands wild areas.

Now, the Camp Fire has revealed some of the under-appreciated benefits of pairing residential and local solar systems with battery storage in local grid areas in load centers. Instead of long high-voltage transmission lines from remote power stations (such as those far out in the desert), crossing wildlands with forest and brush fuels.

The Los Angeles Times has detailed how potentially 2,000 wildfires have been ignited by utility transmission and electrical equipment in California.

Those claiming Distributed Generation (DG) such as rooftop solar is too expensive comp ared to remote utility-scale solar and wind projects, are not taking into account the benefits that should be priced in to DG that does not need expensive transmission lines stretching often hundreds of miles (and which ratepayers pay for).

PG&E, after claims of their transmission equipment sparking the Camp Fire last year--the most deadly wildfire in California history, says it cannot afford the insurance, liability, and litigation, and will undergo Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing supposedly this week. A U. S. District Court judge ordered the Investor Owned Utility to plan and fund a gigantic transmission inspection and vegetation clearing from around their transmission infrastructure--a plan which PG&E said it could not afford. High winds knocking tree branches onto wires is apparently a big problem.

The large northern and central California utility's bankruptcy calls into question existing Power Purchase Agreements, including Topax Solar Project in Carrizo Plain, and a unit of the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System. We will be watching to see what happens.

 

NEWS ARCHIVE >>here.