Defenders of Wildlife Blog

Approval by Imperial County officials means work can begin on what will be the world’s largest solar farm.

The project will produce enough electricity to power more than 200,000 households and create about 700 construction jobs.

Conservation groups say they support it because it isn’t being built on environmentally sensitive public lands. Kim Delfino, California program director for Defenders of Wildlife, says the project is a great example of the “right way” to develop solar energy.

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Listen to Defenders’ Kim Delfino on California News Service radio.

“There’s a lot of land out there. They don’t need to be going into these more intact, pristine areas. We think that, with good planning and good information, they can choose good, low-impact sites.”

Burrowing owls like this one are threatened by the Calico solar project.

Delfino calls the proposed California-based Calico solar project near Barstow an example of the “wrong way” to develop solar. She says the project fails to meet basic environmental-protection requirements and threatens fragile wildlife.

The Calico project covers more than 4,000 acres of vital wildlife habitat in the Mojave Desert’s Pisgah Valley, she says, and is located on key habitat for the desert tortoise.

“Despite the fact that we have been meeting with the developer of this site for the last three years, urging them to move the project because of the conflicts with wildlife, they’ve chosen to move ahead.”

Defenders of Wildlife, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club are filing a federal lawsuit in an attempt to stop the Calico project.

Lori Abbott, Public News Service – CA

Gov. Scott vetoed the Jurassic Park bill, which would have allowed state zoos to lease state lands for research on animals like rhinos.

Which is worse: an elephant in the room or rhino in the backyard? Thanks to a move by Florida Governor Rick Scott, residents of the Sunshine State won’t have to find out–at least for now. He put an end to the state’s controversial “Jurassic Park” bill on Friday, vetoing the piece of legislation that would have allowed state zoos and aquariums to lease state-owned land to conduct breeding and research on animals including giraffes, zebras and rhinos.

While rejecting HB 1117,, Gov. Scott wrote that it “lacks sufficient safeguards” to “ensure the protection of state … lands, native species and habitats.” That’s a message Defenders has been delivering to Tallahassee ever since the Florida Legislature sent the measure to Gov. Scott’s desk in March. Evidence shows that exotic animals and plants can cause serious costly damage to our public lands, and present an array of serious problems including the escape of animals, the spread of nonnative seed from feed, and potential spread of disease.

Florida ecosystems and native wildlife are already at risk from exotic species run wild. And as America saw last fall in Ohio, escaped animals may even pose a threat to people and property.

Defenders’ Laurie Macdonald said of the bill’s rejection, “Gov. Scott’s veto signals a commitment to protecting the natural Florida we all know and love. Now our public land managers can concentrate on fulfilling their mission of protecting and restoring native wildlife and habitat—without fear of an angry rhino stomping on  those plans.”

Animals like the Florida panther depend on the state's public lands for survival.

This victory comes with a caveat – technically the state already has the authority to lease lands out to this purpose. But as Laurie warned the Tampa Bay Times, “We will be watching very closely any applications for this use.”

YOU DID IT!

Thanks go out to the thousands of Defenders supporters wrote to Gov. Scott asking him to veto this misguided bill. Your efforts help protect the native wildlife that makes Florida such a unique and special place!

Learn more about how we’re working to protect Florida wildlife and habitats.

SAN DIEGO – Four major conservation groups today announced their support for a set of proposed large-scale solar power projects in Imperial County, Calif., because of the project meets the need to promote well-located clean energy development, demonstrate the care taken to address wildlife concerns, and create good union jobs. The Sierra Club, Audubon California, Defenders of Wildlife and the Natural Resources Defense Council all support the projects, which the Imperial County Board of Supervisors approved today.

When completed, the Mt. Signal, Calexico I and Calexico II solar projects under development by 8minutenergy will produce about 600 megawatts of electricity each year, enough to power more than 200,000 households. The projects are located on privately owned, disturbed land currently used to grow highly water-intensive landscaping grasses. The biological effects from the projects are significantly less than proposed renewable energy projects on environmentally sensitive public lands. These Imperial County projects show that it is possible to develop viable, cost-effective projects without sacrificing our precious desert wildlands.

“By choosing a project site with very few impacts to wildlife, 8minuteenergy has shown that renewable energy can be developed quickly and without sacrificing sensitive wildlife and wild lands,” said Kim Delfino, Defenders of Wildlife’s California program director. “These projects are shining examples of how to develop solar energy right.”

Read the groups’ full statement.

The Calico project's footprint, comprised of fields of solar panels similar to this one, will fall on 4,000 acres of public land in California, including key habitat for threatened desert tortoise.

BREAKING: The proposed California-based Calico solar project fails to meet basic environmental protection requirements and threatens imperiled wildlife, according to Defenders of Wildlife, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club. The groups are filing a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of the Interior after failing to reach agreement with the developers and the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to move the project to a location without major environmental conflicts.  

Read our fact sheet to learn more about what’s wrong with the Calico project.

Over the course of three years, the environmental groups met 10 times with the Bureau of Land Management and Calico’s current and former developers, K-Road Power and Tessera Solar (respectively), to urge the developers and Interior to relocate the project to less environmentally sensitive lands. Some of these options included degraded private agricultural lands near the proposed project that would significantly reduce the project’s impacts and bring it more in line with “smart from the start” principles. All these options were rejected.

The proposed project covers 4,000-plus-acres of vital wildlife habitat in the Mojave Desert’s Pisgah Valley – an area four times as large as San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park – and is located on key desert tortoise habitat that connects several tortoise recovery areas in the region. Building a solar project here, the groups contend, would threaten at least six other imperiled animals and plants, including golden eagles, burrowing owls and Mojave fringe-toed lizard.

Desert tortoise benefit from smart planning of solar power projects.

Defenders, NRDC and the Sierra Club have previously supported or reached agreements with developers of five of the seven large-scale solar projects approved in California by Interior since 2009. This consensus building effort resulted in better projects that would create almost 3,670 construction jobs, about 525 permanent jobs and nearly 2,600 megawatts of clean power while minimizing impacts on key species and wild lands.

Collaborative solar development efforts among these conservation groups, solar developers and federal, state and local agencies will continue, including a joint effort to help shape Interior’s national solar program that will provide a robust blueprint for successful and responsible solar development on public lands in California and the rest of the West.

Following are statements from leaders of the conservation groups presenting the lawsuit:

Kim Delfino, Defenders' California program director.

“What’s frustrating about the Calico solar project is that the developer and the Bureau of Land Management can avoid the worst impacts to wildlife by being ‘smart from the start’ and moving the project to degraded agricultural lands near the proposed site,” said Kim Delfino, Defenders of Wildlife’s California program director. “If this project moves forward at this location, Calico will irreversibly harm the sensitive Pisgah Valley and the desert tortoise.”

“We drew a line in the sand and the Calico solar project crossed it,” said Johanna Wald, senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council. “My colleagues and I tried very hard to avoid litigation and filed this suit as the last resort. We have focused instead on consensus building to improve as many large-scale solar projects as possible to transition our nation to clean energy sources while protecting wild lands and wildlife. The Calico project, however, is an example of a solar project done wrong from the start.”

“The Pisgah Valley is just too critical for desert tortoise recovery and for a whole suite of important desert species like golden eagles,” said Sierra Club Senior Representative Barbara Boyle. “We need to build renewable energy, but we can find much better places that don’t harm important wildlife and habitat.”

The U.S. Forest Service released today its final forest-planning rule, which will guide the management of 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands across the country.

The following is a statement from Jamie Rappaport Clark, president and CEO of Defenders of Wildlife:

“The Obama administration has made a very strong commitment to wildlife and land conservation with the release of its final forest-planning rule. The forest policy charts a new course to conserve and restore the health and integrity of these lands and waters, and now the hard work for implementing the rule begins today. Moving forward, it will be critical for the Forest Service to make this vision a reality as it issues implementation policies and begins writing forest plans. Defenders of Wildlife is committed to working with the Forest Service as it transforms its stewardship and wildlife conservation obligations to ensure that our nation’s forests, wildlife and waters are protected for generations to come.”

The new guidelines encourage "smart from the start" wind-energy development.

BREAKING: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) released today voluntary guidelines for wildlife and wind energy development. 

The guidelines could improve on how wind energy development is done today — encouraging the use of the best available scientific information and early public engagement in a project’s planning phase, as well as post-construction wildlife monitoring and a comprehensive strategy for mitigating unavoidable impacts.

“Wind energy is an important part of our clean energy future, but to fully realize the benefits of wind power, projects have to be built in the right ways and right places to avoid and minimize their impacts on wildlife,” said Jamie Rappaport Clark, Defenders’ president and CEO. “If implemented correctly, these guidelines will become part of a larger approach that encourages renewable energy companies to be ‘smart from the start’.”

The guidelines apply to private and public lands, imperiled wildlife (like many bat species) not already protected by the Endangered Species or Migratory Bird Treaty acts, and habitats not under FWS’ jurisdiction – lessening the likelihood that wind energy projects will further threaten species in decline.

“Responsible wind energy development means requiring strong standards for protecting wildlife and their habitats. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s wind energy guidelines are a good first step,” she said.

Defenders of Wildlife sat on the federal advisory committee – comprised of scientists, industry representatives, state and federal agencies, tribes, conservation organizations and others – whose recommendations formed the foundation for the new guidelines.

“These guidelines were developed after lengthy discussions with scientists, conservation organizations, wind industry representatives, tribes, state wildlife agencies and the Fish and Wildlife Service. Wind-energy developers who choose to follow the voluntary guidelines will have more certainty that their projects can move forward,” Clark said.