July 1, 2009—The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and other federal agencies recently announced that they will help the Western U.S. to tap its clean energy potential and create green jobs. DOE and the Western Governors’ Association (WGA) released a joint report that takes the first steps toward identifying areas in the West that have the potential for large-scale renewable energy developments with low environmental impacts.
The “Western Renewable Energy Zones—Phase 1 Report” (.pdf file) identifies geographic areas with at least 1,500 megawatts (MW) of high-quality renewable energy resources within a 100-mile radius, excluding environmentally sensitive areas and other high-value lands. The report identifies 37 “hubs” for renewable energy development in the 11 western states, as well as 15 hubs in the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia (one straddles the border with the U.S.), plus 2 hubs in Mexico’s Baja California. All are part of the same transmission network, the Western Interconnect.
The hubs, which have not yet been screened for wildlife sensitivities, cluster together in the sunny, geothermally active Desert Southwest and along the windy eastern border of the region, but renewable energy hubs are present in every western state and province. Combined, the hubs reportedly have enough renewable energy resources to potentially support nearly 200,000 MW of renewable power of various kinds. The U.S. hubs alone could potentially support more than 180,000 MW of renewable power. For comparison, the entire U.S. generating capacity equaled roughly a million megawatts in 2007, notes DOE.
Taking full advantage of the renewable energy potential in the West will require long-term, coordinated transmission planning across the U.S., notes DOE. To help achieve that goal, DOE announced $169.5 million in new funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to support regional transmission system planning and analysis; to help states and public utility commissions accelerate reviews of the large number of electric utility requests expected; and for state and local governments to ensure the resiliency of the electrical grid.
