Regulators released a draft of the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan on Friday, giving California its first look at a document that could transform how solar, wind, geothermal and transmission projects are sited in the desert.
The goal of the long-awaited plan — known as the DRECP — is to establish a new framework for balancing renewable energy development with the protection of environmental and cultural resources, a source of constant tension in the desert. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell will appear at an event in North Palm Springs on Tuesday, almost certainly to discuss the plan or announce its impending release.
The plan will designate zones for renewable energy development and conservation across 22.5 million acres of public and private land in the Mojave and Colorado deserts, spanning seven counties: Riverside, Imperial, Inyo, Kern, Los Angeles, San Bernardino, and San Diego.
Two state and two federal agencies — the California Energy Commission, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the federal Bureau of Land Management, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services — have spent nearly six years crafting the conservation plan, which has faced continual delays.
But while that timeline has long since been abandoned, BLM spokeswoman Dana Wilson confirmed to The Desert Sun that a draft will be published next week. That confirmation followed a public meeting Wednesday at which Vicki Campbell — the conservation plan’s program manager for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) — outlined the components of the document, in order to prepare members of the BLM’s conservation plan advisory group to navigate the upcoming draft.
Campbell revealed few specifics about the plan Wednesday, but she did say it would allow for up to 20,000 megawatts of new renewable energy development by 2040. Energy projects would be allowed only in “development-focused areas,” where they would receive streamlined review, approval and permitting processes.
Link to DRECP: http://www.drecp.org/draftdrecp/