Renewable energy will become more prevalent in Nevada and Arizona, as the Interior Department has approved three new green energy plants. The plants will deliver 520 megawatts (MW) of electricity, enough to power almost 200,000 homes and businesses.
The new approvals include solar and geothermal plants in Nevada and a solar facility in Arizona. Nevada will see construction of Midland Solar Energy Project, which will produce 350 megawatts (MW) of electricity, as well as a 70-megawatt geothermal facility, the New York Canyon Geothermal Project. The Quartzsite solar facility will produce 100 MW of electricity in Arizona.
Solar production has been especially popular in Arizona which, along with California, is one of the states where solar energy production is most common. The Solana plant will be one of the world's largest solar production facilities. In April, construction of the first 17 MW of production capability was completed at the Foothills solar power plant. The facility will be providing its full capacity of 35 MW of energy by the end of the year.
Environmission, an Australian company, is trying to get in on the solar energy market as well with a unique design. They intend to build a greenhouse-like structure in western Arizona that would heat air, sending it up through a 2,400-foot solar chimney, spinning a turbine to produce electricity. Unlike most power-production systems, it would not require water to run. A smaller version of the device ran for eight years in Spain. The project was first presented in 2009, but is currently waiting for $750 million dollars in funding.
Arizona currently produces 12 percent of its energy needs from solar, while Nevada reaches half that percentage. Even at just six percent total production from solar, Nevada still ranks as the state with the fourth-highest use of power from solar sources. NV Energies, which supplies 90 percent of the people of Nevada with power was recently acquired by billionaire investor Warren Buffett.
Some of the solar production in Nevada is encouraged by the Nevada Rooftop Solar Initiative. This program's goal is for five percent of all single-family homes and businesses to be equipped with rooftop solar systems.
Nationwide, the United States produces a total capacity of about 5.12 gigawatts (GW) of solar production. NPD Solarbuzz, a market research group for the industry, predicts that American homes and business will add a total of 4.3 gigawatts (GW) of solar power in 2013, a 20 percent increase over 2012.
Since 2009, the Interior Department has approved 25 solar, 11 geothermal and 9 wind facilities to produce renewable energy.
