The state of California has approved a solar project in the Mojave Desert on land that serves as a migration corridor for desert bighorn sheep and habitat for the desert tortoise.Scientists and conservation advocates say the approval threatens one of the last intact desert ecosystems in California, but the California Energy Commission says ecological mitigation will reduce the impacts on wildlife and that the project will bring more renewable energy to the state.The Mojave is already fragmented by Interstate 15, and solar projects add further threats; the ability to move between mountains is what keeps the bighorn sheep population from collapsing.
The Mojave Desert may look like a flat, brown stretch of nothing between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. But threading through its rocky mountain ranges is an intricate network of wildlife movement that has sustained desert species for thousands of years. Now, scientists and advocates say a solar project approved by the state of California threatens to sever it.
In April, the California Energy Commission, the state agency that oversees energy infrastructure, voted 4-0 to approve a $700 million, 1,080-hectare (2,670-acre) solar facility proposed by New Jersey-based developer VC Renewables on federal land adjacent to the Mojave National Preserve. The preserve, spanning more than 1.6 million acres, is one of the largest in the U.S. National Park System and is located in Southern California.
