Interior Secretary Ken Salazar recently announced that the United States will be dedicating an area in the Nevada desert to solar energy studies. The government has set aside twenty-five square miles of desert in Nevada, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The site is an old atomic weapons testing location and the announced project will be overseen by the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration.
The location was chosen because of the extended presence of the sun and the overall infrastructure conditions of the area in allowing solar energy development. The government is planning on attracting novel ideas in the solar technology field. The plan is to test a number of new solar technologies and determine which ones will be most advantageous to use overall.
Thus far the layout plans for the twenty-five square miles are expected to be completed sometime in September of this year. However, environmental reviews of the project will not be completed until around June 2011. Construction of the Nevada site is expected to begin in September 2011.
