Daniel Salzler No. 1086
EnviroInsight.org Six Items January 22, 2021
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1. Tribes want Biden to balance technology and cultural issues in renewable energy projects
President-elect Joe Biden has pledged that his administration will prioritize renewable energy to reduce greenhouse gases and slow or stop the rapid warming of the planet.
He has also promised to give tribes a greater voice in managing public lands with cultural significance to tribal communities.
The potential for conflict arises because the same massive solar and wind projects that would help meet renewable energy goals frequently threaten to devastate tribal cultural, religious and burial areas.
Tribes and environmentalists wonder what, if anything, the new administration will do to balance those goals, building renewable power generation while still protecting culturally important areas, particularly in the West.
“Project development needs to be done in a responsible, respectable way,” said Brian Golding Sr., a member of the Quechan Tribe and vice president of the Ah-Mut Pipa Foundation. “And that involves paying attention to what Native folk have to say about that land and its meaning.”
Large solar projects, known as “utility-scale,” can range from 1 million megawatts to more than 20 million megawatts, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and the Solar Energy Industries Association.
The Freeing Energy Project estimated that some 13 million acres, or 21,250 square miles of land, would have to be covered with solar panels to satisfy the U.S.’s electric power needs for one year.
But while those projects could eventually help wean the U.S. from fossil fuel consumption and the consequences of releasing greenhouse gas into an already-saturated atmosphere, they can also harm sensitive cultural and ecological zones. Emmerich said opponents point to impacts ranging from cultural resources and landscapes to loss of wildlife habitat. But he believes the biggest factor relates to economics.
“I think the real reason that very controversial areas are getting developed is because these plants have to be located by good transmission infrastructure, which makes it very quick and cheaper for a solar or wind developer to plug into the grid.”
And, he said, those lands are often the same lands that tribes and environmentalists seek to protect. One tribe succeeds, another fails to stop a project.
At least one large solar project in the Sonoran and Mojave deserts has already wreaked havoc on tribal cultural sites.
The Genesis Solar Energy Project in eastern Riverside County, California, was constructed in 2012 along a pre-contact trade route used by Indigenous peoples for millennia to transport goods from the California coast to the Southwest and back. The project was built over the objections of the Colorado River Indian Tribes, known as CRIT, and the Fort Mojave Indian Tribe.
Construction equipment tore through trails and funerary sites, and damaged or destroyed food preparation and hunting tools, and other important cultural artifacts, wiping out thousands of years of tribal history. The solar plant sits on 125 acres in Ford Dry Lake, about 25 miles west of Blythe.
The owner of the plant, NextEra Energy, was required to contribute $3 million on an ethnographic study and scholarships for Native students. CRIT sued to stop the project but lost the case.
Tribal officials successfully argued that the Bureau of Land Management failed to consult with the tribe until after the project had won approval, a clear violation of the National Historic Preservation Act. The 709-megawatt plant would have been placed on 6,500 acres of land that contained hundreds of cultural assets, including funerary sites.
The plan, negotiated with the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation and state historic preservation officers in the six states that the agreement covers, details how provisions of the National Historic Preservation Act will be followed.
Indian law attorney Troy Eid noted in a recent article that the Solar PA is an umbrella agreement to guide BLM in the permitting process to reduce time and mitigate potential challenges to projects. Also, he wrote, the Solar PA calls for early and ongoing communications with tribes and to include them in the process.
In addition to the cultural issues, environmentalists worry that utility-scale projects take a toll on sensitive desert ecosystems. Emmerich, of Basin and Range Watch, noted that wildlife are attracted to the reflective panels, which from a distance appear to be a water source. “We found about three times the amount of avian mortality on the solar energy sites than other areas,” he said. “Something is killing birds.” Emmerich said the main theory is that the solar panels mimic a lake and the birds fly into the panels. Either the collision or dehydration kills them. He said the Desert Sunlight Project south of Joshua Tree National Park reported some of the most alarming numbers in that particular category.
Energy Project in Southern California in 2016. Environmentalists said that many birds are being killed by utility-grade projects. COURTESY CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY VIA NEXTERA
Desert tortoises are also affected by habitat loss, he said.
Then there’s the carbon impact. “When we damage or destroy a desert ecosystem, we don’t have this anchor that actually absorbs and sequesters CO2,” said Emmerich. “That’s one of the main reasons that we build these things, to stop climate change.”
The clash between renewable energy projects and tribal cultural protection isn’t limited to Western deserts.
Golding, of the Quechan Tribe, said tribes aren’t opposed to renewable energy development if it’s done properly.“It’s possible that there are spaces can be identified where this kind of development can happen,” Golding said. “But many projects choose not to inquire or to listen to the concerns that are raised during the development process.”
Golding also said the destruction of cultural patrimony in these lands affects tribes’ ability to negotiate in the future, since the evidence of their existence over the past millennia would now be gone, “especially for tribes that aren’t inhabiting their aboriginal territory.” That includes many tribes whose land bases were reduced to small tracts of trust land.
“Development like some of the renewable energy projects would further eradicate the evidence that we’re here first,” he said.
Emmerich agreed with Golding that there are better ways to build renewable energy plants that don’t involve tearing up pristine deserts. One alternative: brownfields. Those are properties such as abandoned gas stations, dry cleaners, industrial properties, strip malls, and commercial properties where chemicals have been used. Although some can contain hazardous materials, others can be more easily cleaned up for redevelopment.
“It’s a far better alternative to developing pristine habitat or bulldozing ancient cultural sites,” Emmerich said.
“A lot of them already have transmission lines going up to them — it seems like a no-brainer right there.”
He added that the Environmental Protection Agency has identified approximately 15 million acres of brownfields in the United States. The barrier, Emmerich said, is money. “Utilities and the developers want the quickest return.”
Although Biden’s tribal policy plan pledged that tribes would have a greater say in managing public lands, transition officials did not respond to questions seeking specifics on how the administration would balance its drive to build renewable energy infrastructure, which would require millions of acres of land, with tribal cultural concerns.
Colorado River Indian Tribes Chairwoman Amelia Flores said she hopes Biden will hold to his word to work with Indian Country and revisit the entire span of policies that could have an impact on tribal sacred and cultural sites. Flores said she understands change won’t happen overnight but was hopeful the Biden administration would “eventually within the next four years, make some changes for the betterment of Indian Country. Read more at AZ Republic Source; Debra Utacia Krol, Arizona Republic
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3. Colorado River Water Supply Report As of December 27, 2020
4. Tucson Treecycle Concludes This Weekend – The City of Tucson’s annual TreeCycle program continues through Sunday, Jan. 17. Nine sites are open for collection. Residents are asked to remove all lights, ornaments, decorations, plastic tree bags, and tree stands before dropping off real trees at a TreeCycle site. Due to the pandemic, please wear a mask and practice social distancing when dropping off your tree. Please do not leave trees outside the collection time or area due to fire hazards. The City of Tucson will not collect Christmas trees from curbs and alleys. For more information on sites, hours, and locations, follow the link below.
TreeCycle
5. Keep FOG Out Of The Sewers. Tucson 16th Annual Grease Collection And Recycling Event This Weekend – Start off the new year right by taking your leftover holiday grease to the 16th annual Grease Collection and Recycling Event. Six collection sites will be open to accept fats, oils, and grease stored in containers this Saturday, Jan. 9, from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. The Pima County Regional Wastewater Reclamation Department (RWRD) reminds you that these items from your kitchen should never be poured down the drain.
They can be recycled into biodiesel, a cleaner-burning fuel. Follow the links below for more information and drop-off locations. To ensure the volunteers and community participants remain safe during the pandemic, you’re asked to wear a mask when dropping off grease containers. You can also take grease, fats, and oils to the City of Tucson’s Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) program. Follow the HHW link below for the address and hours.
Pima County Protect Our Pipes/Grease Collection
Pima County RWRD
HHW
6. A Draft Surface Water Protection Map
A Draft Surface Water Protection Program Map* is now available on our permittee resources page. The waterbodies shown on the map reflect the current state of the draft proposed program and will be updated as the program is amended. If you would like to provide feedback regarding the waterbodies shown on the draft map, please contact us at watersofarizona@azdeq.gov.
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