U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Lands and Minerals Administration Laura Daniel-Davis recently announced new government initiatives to support solar development on public lands in the West and help achieve the country's ambitious renewable energy and protect the target.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), an agency of the U.S. Department of the Interior, will develop an updated plan to guide responsible solar development activities on public lands through an updated Solar Project Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS) based on the 2012 version. The 2012 Solar PEIS identified Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, and Utah as states with high solar potential and low resource conflict to guide responsible solar development. Now through 2022, the BLM will add more states, adjust exclusion criteria and seek to identify new or expanded areas to prioritize solar deployment.

Meanwhile, the BLM is initiating a review of three proposed solar projects on public lands in Arizona with an estimated combined capacity of more than 1 GW. They are the proposed 600 MW utility-scale Jove Solar Project in southeastern La Paz County, the 250 MW Pinyon Solar Project in Maricopa County, and the 300 MW Elizabeth Solar Project in Yuma County.