Las Vegas Review-Journal | By Henry Brean | Link to article
Calling them trailblazers in an industry she expects to grow and improve, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell on Monday applauded the developers of two very different solar energy projects built with federal help on public land near Primm.
“It’s paving the way for the future. It’s paving the way for green energy,” she said of the work under way in the Ivanpah Valley, about 40 miles south of Las Vegas. “Thank you for being pioneers.”
Jewell’s comments came after she visited a working, 52-megawatt array of solar collectors in Nevada and then crossed the valley into California to tour what is expected to be the world’s largest solar power plant of its kind when it starts operation later this year.
At California’s Ivanpah Solar, near Primm, 3,500 acres of mirrors are used to focus sunlight onto three boiler towers to generate up to 377 megawatts of electricity, enough for more than 100,000 California homes. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell visited the facility Monday.
