BLM identifies acreage suitable for solar development

This story is excerpted from the MT Lowdown, a weekly newsletter digest containing original reporting and analysis published every Friday.

According to a newly published roadmap from the Bureau of Land Management, about 572,000 acres of land in Montana have some baseline potential for utility-scale solar development, more than double the acreage the agency identified in the draft Environmental Impact Statement it released in January.

The revised Western Solar Plan released in late August identifies 31 million acres of BLM-administered land that could be suitable for solar projects of five megawatts or greater across an 11-state region of the West. It prioritizes areas that are previously disturbed or close to existing or planned transmission lines and that would minimize conflicts related to cultural and historical resources and sensitive wildlife (e.g., threatened species, sage grouse habitat, big game winter range and migration corridors).

The expanded Montana acreage reflects changes the agency made to the plan based on more than 64,000 comments fielded on the draft EIS. In addition to lowering the distance and voltage thresholds required to meet the agency’s proximity-to-transmission criteria, the agency incorporated previously disturbed lands that aren’t located near transmission lines in the revised plan. 

BLM Director Tracy Stone-Manning said in an Aug. 29 press release that the proposal supports long-term energy security and will put the country’s largest federal land manager to work to support the Biden administration’s clean energy goals.

“It will drive responsible solar development to locations with fewer potential conflicts while helping the nation transition to a clean energy economy, furthering the BLM’s mission to sustain the health, diversity and productivity of public lands for the use and enjoyment of present and future generations,” Stone-Manning said.

Parcels incorporated in the Montana portion of the plan are largely concentrated in the north-central region of the state and the area east of Miles City, which are along the corridor of a planned 525-kilovolt transmission line that will connect the eastern and western power grids.

The solar-suitable acreage in Montana is relatively modest compared to that of other western states. For example, the agency has identified more than 3.8 million acres of BLM land in Wyoming as potentially appropriate for solar development.

According to the agency’s final EIS, which serves as a precursor to the project-level environmental analyses that will be required before any on-the-ground work occurs, about 5,400 acres of BLM land in Montana could be developed for solar by 2045 under the “reasonably foreseeable development scenario.” That’s the least of any of the 11 states analyzed in the plan.

As of June 30, the agency has permitted 52 solar projects on its land in the western U.S., together capable of generating nearly 9,600 megawatts of power. Half of those projects are located in California, which was incorporated into the decade-old Western Solar Plan that’s being replaced with the new guidance.

The agency is expected to issue a record of decision finalizing the plan in December.