The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has expanded the scope of potential solar development on federal lands, opening several more western states to gigawatts of PV deployment.
In January 2024, the Dept. of the Interior issued an update for the Solar Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement, also known as the Western Solar Plan, which formalized the processes for building solar on federal land west of the Rocky Mountains. The Western Solar Plan was published in 2012 and initially opened designated federal land in California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico to solar development. This latest update to the plan expands federal land in Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington and Wyoming to solar development, as well.
“Solar energy is an affordable and fast-growing component of the nation’s modern power supply and is helping the United States build a strong and resilient clean energy economy. The updated Western Solar Plan will ensure that solar project permitting is more efficient and offers clarity for project developers while maintaining flexibility to adapt to local needs and concerns,” said Steve Feldgus, principal deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management, in a press release.
The 2012 version of the Western Solar Plan established a framework for permitting solar projects larger than 20 MW on federal land in those six initial states. It identified “solar energy zones,” or sites ripe for solar project development, and created parameters for PV project designs. It also laid out protections for minimizing construction impacts in those environments…