Return of the Flat-Tailed Horned Lizard

The flat-tailed horned lizard has become a powerful stakeholder in the world of California solar facility siting. As the L.A. Times reports, a federal judge has reinstated a proposed listing of the flat-tailed horned lizard as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. The Ninth Circuit recently overturned a Bush administration decision not to list the FTHL -- the latest round in an epic, 16-year legal saga over the species' listing.

The Department of Interior is anticipated to make a final decision on the FTHL in one year. But an Obama administration decision to protect the FTHL should not be assumed: this is a political cross hair.

The inaptly termed "Solar Two Project" -- the first utility-scale solar project to undergo environmental review in the United States -- is now before the California Energy Commission. This proposed 750 MW facility, located on 10 square miles of Bureau of Land Management land in the California desert, requires the construction of 30,000, 25-kw “solar concentrator” dishes, each of which is nearly 40 feet high and 40 feet wide. Following closely behind, the "Solar One Project" is at the beginning stages of environmental review. There are several more utility-scale solar projects waiting in the wings. And all of these projects are on federal BLM land.

Utility-scale solar projects are a completely different animal from even the largest wind energy projects; almost the entire project footprint will be covered by solar dishes. Any kind of development project on this scale, with near-complete footprint coverage of ten square miles of land, will invariably encounter significant, and often insurmountable, environmental review obstacles. Where, as here, the project is also on federal land -- requiring separate state and federal environmental reviews -- the environmental pitfalls of the project are only further magnified.

A fenced-off, ten square mile site does not bode well for FTHL habitat. Or for wetlands. Or for just about any environmental resource. That does not mean that these utility-scale solar projects should not be built; but it does mean that the federal government will need to decide whether to fast-track these projects on BLM land while recognizing that the environmental impact of these projects will, for one FTHL reason or another, be significant. Should the Department of Interior decide not to list the FTHL, significant environmental review issues with utility-scale solar projects will nonetheless remain. No easy fix to this reality exists, and the federal government should not decide against listing the FTHL with the false hope that such an easy fix could be obtained.