Using that land control, BLM has just proposed a monstrous plan for solar power development called the Western Solar Plan.
The biggest concern by far is not addressed, namely, what this monstrosity is going to cost the poor people who have to pay for it.
By coincidence, the standard estimate for conventional utility-scale solar is also nice and round at $1,000,000 a MW. So the Plan costs one hundred billion dollars to build, plus all those access roads.
In this way, solar and wind both increase the cost of thermal power, making wind and solar look cheaper than they really are.
Let us call this cost of keeping the thermal generator steam hot while the sun shines the backup cost of the Solar Plan.
Then there are annual O&M, operation and management costs.
That's about 1.2 square miles totally and completely converted from raw scrub brush land to functioning solar power plant EVERY SINGLE DAY!
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