Secretary Salazar’s Interior Department has made dramatic progress in siting utility-scale renewable energy projects on our public lands over the past three years. When President Obama came into office in January 2009, there were no solar projects permitted on our public lands — despite the availability of world class solar resources in the tens of millions of acres of public lands in the sunny desert southwest.
What a difference three years can make. As of July 2012, our Department has permitted 31 major renewable energy projects with the capacity to generate nearly 7,000 megawatts and meet the power needs of about two million homes. A majority of that new renewable energy involves utility-scale solar projects. Indeed, workers are constructing – right now — some of the world’s largest solar facilities in the deserts of California and Nevada.
Fonte: White House