Bureau of Land Management Pushes Ahead With Bonanza Solar Project Despite Huge Conflicts
April 27, 2023 - Cactus Springs, NV - Bonanza Solar west of Indian Springs, Nevada is being pushed forward by the Interior Department in one of the most important identified desert tortoise areas in Nevada. We found a large female on the site yesterday, Tragic it may be bulldozed. https://www.blm.gov/press-release/bureau-land-management-begin-nepa-process-bonanza-solar-project-application
^Healthy adult Mojave desert tortoise on the site of the porposed large-scale solar project north of cactus Springs, in an intact landscape.
^The Mojave yuccas were blooming in abundance this spring on the proposed project site after a rainy winter.
^This project is proposed on high quality Mojave desert tortoise connectivity habitat in an intact landscape.
^Mojave desert tortoise on the proposed project site. These tortoise would have to be dug out of their burrows and translocated, resulting in a certain percentage of mortality. We find this unacceptable when solar panels can go on disturbed lands, on rooftops, and over parking lots.
Basin & Range Watch Nominates a New Area of Critical Environmental Concern To Protect Tortoise and Springs
^Lush stands of big galleta grass make excellent Mojave desert tortoise habitat, but are threatened by utility-scale solar applications.
September 19, 2022, Indian Springs Valley NV - Basin & Range Watch and colleagues are nominating the Cactus Springs Area of Critical Environmental Concern (ACEC) in Clark and Nye Counties, Nevada, north of Indian Springs on Bureau of Land Management land, in order to protect rare plants, cactus diversity, Cactus Springs water resources, and the most significant Mojave desert tortoise connectivity corridor in southern Nevada. Read more here: Cactus Springs ACEC nomination.
Proposed Bonanza Solar Project on High Quality Mojave Desert Habitat
"The Most Critical Desert Tortoise Connectivity Corridor in Southern Nevada"
^The limestone fans here are habitat for a diversity of Mojave Desert succulents: Mojave yucca, silver cholla, and calico cactus.
June 18, 2020 - Las Vegas, NV - A large, over 2,000-acre, solar energy project is proposed to be built just north of Cactus Springs on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in Clark County, Nevada. The site is on the alluvial fans along the eastern side of the Spring Range. The project would harm fragile desert wildlife, remove thousands of desert plants like Mojave yuccas, impact the desert tortoise, destroy archeology sites, create dust, fence off public land, and be visually unsightly.
This is Mojave desert tortoise habitat, and once again as the species is heading towards extinction in the wild, the proposal to build the solar project anyway and translocate tortoises is being pushed.
Yet the agencies acknowledge there are impacts. From the Medium Priority letter whereby BLM determined this area has significant challenges associated with building a utility-scale solar project:
Southern Nevada Renewable Energy Projects Update
June 9, 2022 - Las Vegas, NV - The Southern Nevada District of Bureau of Land Management released this slide deck in PDF form of a useful summary of all solar and wind applications in Clark County and Nye County south of Beatty. See the BLM Southern Nevada District Renewable Energy Program Update PDF.
Proposed Bonanza Solar Project on High Quality Mojave Desert Habitat
^The limestone fans here are habitat for a diversity of Mojave Desert succulents: Mojave yucca, silver cholla, and calico cactus.
June 18, 2020 - Las Vegas, NV - A large, over 2,000-acre, solar energy project is proposed to be built just north of Cactus Springs on land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in Clark County, Nevada. The site is on the alluvial fans along the eastern side of the Spring Range. The project would harm fragile desert wildlife, remove thousands of desert plants like Mojave yuccas, impact the desert tortoise, destroy archeology sites, create dust, fence off public land, and be visually unsightly.
The project is called Bonanza Solar. The company is from France and called EDF Renewables LLC.
^Map of the proposed Bonanza Solar Project along US 95.
"The Most Critical Desert Tortoise Connectivity Corridor in Southern Nevada"
This is Mojave desert tortoise habitat, and once again as the species is heading towards extinction in the wild, the proposal to build the solar project anyway and translocate tortoises is being pushed.
Yet the agencies acknowledge there are impacts. From the Medium Priority letter whereby BLM determined this area has significant challenges associated with building a utility-scale solar project:
The BLM is more concerned about this one as it is located in a tortoise least-cost connectivity corridor. The tortoise population there has seen a drought die off and has been impacted. The BLM is concerned about this one but tells us they are trying to work something out because it is a Fast 41 Infrastructure project. We will be hearing more in September.
From the Tortoise Report:
Field Visit
In January 2021 we made a site visit to the proposed project. The area was in drought, but we were surprised what a diverse cactus and succulent garden this is:
^Cottontop cactus (Echinocactus polycephalus).
^Pencil cholla (Cylindropuntia ramosissima).
^Mojave yucca (Yucca schidigera) with a calico cactus (Echinocereus engelmannii) at the base.
^A golden cholla (Cylindropuntia echinocarpa).
^A rare cactus: the Parish club-cholla (Grusonia parishii), growing in a low mat form on the proposed solar project site.
^Close view of the Parish club-cholla.
^The low-growing Parish club-cholla.
^Another Parish club-cholla, with a golden cholla on the left.
^A tall golden cholla.
^Mojave yucca.
^Old trail through the site, probably following an ancient indigenous trail heading north-south between springs. This one is heading south towards Cactus Springs.
^Mojave yuccas would be mulched and removes if a solar project was built here.
^Big galleta grass (Hilaria rigida) on the site.
^Golden cholla, also called silver cholla.
^Colorful spines of cottopntop cactus.
^Mojave yucca.
^Golden cholla.
^Tortoise burrow in a wash bank.
^Burrows of kit fox and possibly kangaroo rats.
^Nevada ephedra (Ephedra nevadensis).
^Unique Parish club-cholla.
^Mojave yucca shaddow.
^Energy developers do not see the beauty in these cactus gardens. They see flat land and the existing transmission lines crossing this area, including the GridLiance line.
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