The winner of November’s presidential election will determine the fate of dozens of pending solar, wind and geothermal power projects that have the potential to power millions of homes and move the nation closer to President Joe Biden’s vision for a green energy economy.
While the Bureau of Land Management since January 2021 has approved 22 utility-scale solar and geothermal power projects, some already in operation, they pale in size and scope to the dozens of proposed utility-scale projects under review in the federal permitting pipeline. Most of these projects are in the earliest phases, and less than half have made it to the formal environmental review process required before they can be approved and begin construction.
The administration is sprinting to get as many of these projects across the finish line as possible before the end of Biden’s term. But it’s not clear how many will make it through the permitting pipeline before Biden could hand the White House over to former President Donald Trump, who has vowed to increase oil and gas drilling and mining activity on federal lands. A second Trump term could mean this large swath of commercial-scale green energy projects are left to languish indefinitely, according to energy analysts, Interior Department observers and academic experts.
“Environmental reviews are highly election sensitive,” said Timothy Fox, an energy analyst at ClearView Energy Partners, an independent energy research and analysis firm. “The Trump administration would likely slow those proceedings considerably, potentially through a de facto halt. Or even reject some of those applications.”
The fate of the projects highlights one of the biggest energy and public lands issues in the election, which could serve as a referendum on the Biden administration’s push to use federal lands to drive the utility-scale onshore solar, wind and geothermal power needed to transition the nation away from fossil fuel energy sources that are helping to drive climate warming.
In the past two months, BLM has advanced a cluster of seven utility-scale solar projects in Nevada — known as Esmeralda 7 — that would rank among the world’s largest, and completed a two-year review of the Lava Ridge Wind Project in Idaho, which would be one of the largest power-producing wind farms in North America.
“President Biden has done far more for renewable energy than any previous president,” said Michael Gerrard, director of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia Law School.
Would Trump really try to undo all of that?
Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic candidate for president who has vowed to continue advancing the administration’s climate agenda, thinks so.
Trump would not only “undo the enormous progress we’ve made the past four years” on renewable energy, but also “threatens to undermine the billions of dollars of investment in new projects and hundreds of thousands of jobs fueled by Biden-Harris policies,” Lauren Hitt, a Harris campaign spokesperson, said in an emailed statement to POLITICO’s E&E News.
Todd Willens, a former Interior chief of staff during the Trump administration, said it’s possible.
“I do not see Trump changing from his ‘all of the above’ or ‘drill baby drill’ energy approach,” said Willens, who is not a part of Trump’s election campaign or inner circle of advisers.
Trump’s previous term in office saw BLM slow renewable energy progress made by former President Barack Obama. Agenda47, the Trump campaign’s official policy platform, mentions almost nothing about renewable energy, instead focusing on cutting regulations and ramping up oil and gas and mining on federal lands.
Karoline Leavitt, the Trump campaign’s national press secretary, did not address questions about the former president’s views on renewable energy and how his administration would handle green energy project permitting.
Instead, in an email Leavitt pointed to Trump campaign pledges about “lifting restrictions on American Energy Production,” and “terminating the Socialist Green New Deal” — a reference to the Biden administration’s multibillion-dollar climate policy agenda Trump has dismissed as a waste of taxpayer money.
That language is consistent with Project 2025, the conservative policy blueprint led by The Heritage Foundation.
The former president has recently distanced himself from Project 2025, calling some of the ideas in the policy handbook “absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.”
But there are numerous connections to Trump in the document.
Among them is William Perry Pendley, the author of the section on the Interior Department, which labels efforts to expand renewable energy as part of a “radical climate agenda.” Trump unsuccessfully nominated the conservative attorney for BLM director, and Pendley ended up leading BLM during the last two years of his presidency despite a federal judge ruling that he was performing the duties of bureau director illegally.
“A second Trump term, particularly if he seeks to implement the radical, deeply unpopular public land objectives of Project 2025, will most likely simply create chaos, and the result could be the loss of several more precious years in the fight against climate change,” said John Leshy, a professor emeritus at the University of California Hastings College of the Law, who served as Interior solicitor during the Clinton administration.
The mere prospects of a Trump victory in November are already slowing investment in green energy projects on federal lands, Gerrard said.
“I’ve spoken with investors who have said that,” he said. “They’re hesitant to put millions of dollars into a project that the next president may try to stop.”
Willens and Casey Hammond, Interior's principal deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management during the Trump presidency, pushed back against critics who say Trump will simply overturn the progress that’s been made to expand green energy on federal lands.
“If I were an applicant for a renewable project I wouldn't be concerned about a change of administration,” said Hammond, who, like Willens, emphasized he’s speaking for himself, and is not privy to Trump’s plans.
What Trump has vowed to do on the campaign trail is repeal the funding supporting Biden’s climate agenda, including grants, tax credits and subsidies for green energy. One prime target is the Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA, which includes billions of dollars in incentives that have sparked a $488 billion investment in utility-scale renewable energy projects since Congress approved it in 2022, according to American Clean Power.
“Having worked in his first administration, I do know he is a man of his word,” Willens said, “and I expect his next energy team to follow his words very closely and seek to carry out his promises from the campaign trail.”
Trump: ‘I hate wind’
Trump has so far not said anything negative about solar and geothermal energy on the campaign trail.
He has a lengthy, and well-chronicled dislike for wind power and wind turbines.
“I hate wind,” Trump said during an April fundraising dinner at his Mar-a-Lago Club and resort in Florida, according to The Washington Post.
Agenda47 states that if elected, Trump would “immediately stop all Joe Biden policies that distort energy markets,” including “insane wind subsidies.”
During Trump’s presidency, the Interior Department rerouted funding and resources away from green energy and toward oil and gas projects on federal lands. Interior also shuttered BLM renewable energy coordination offices established during the Obama administration to help speed up green energy project permitting, and redirected staff and resources to addressing a backlog in application for permits to drill.
More of that is possible in a second Trump term, as permitting reviews of renewable energy projects “would likely slow down because they’re refocusing and prioritizing other resources,” said Fox, who previously worked as an energy adviser in the Department of Homeland Security during the George W. Bush presidency.
Hammond in an email dismissed what he called a “perception that we hindered solar and wind on public lands” during the previous administration.
He also insisted “there was no mandate (from me or elsewhere) to slow down renewables in any way and BLM processed them fairly efficiently.”
Indeed, Trump did not eliminate renewable energy on federal lands while in office.
BLM under Trump approved eight solar projects, four geothermal projects, and one wind energy project on federal lands between 2017 and 2020, according to bureau data. The 13 approved projects — including the 690-megawatt Gemini Solar project in Nevada, which ranks among the nation's largest and is now operational — have an estimated capacity to power about 800,000 homes.
That's substantially less than the 60 solar, wind and geothermal projects capable of powering about 4.5 million homes that were approved in eight years under Obama.
The Biden administration has so far approved 22 solar and geothermal projects, capable of powering about 540,000 homes, the latest BLM data show. Among them is the 500 MW Oberon Solar Project, in Riverside County, California, which is among four approved projects by Biden's BLM that have finished construction and are sending electricity to the grid.
The real payoff for the Biden administration would come from the dozens of proposed projects under review.
The bureau is actively reviewing — through an environmental impact statement or an environmental assessment — 16 solar, other wind and geothermal projects that, if built, would produce enough electricity to power roughly 3.9 million homes. And, on top of that, a further 24 solar, wind and geothermal power projects are in preliminary review, with the potential to proceed to the formal evaluation stage, BLM said.
All told, the 40 solar, wind and geothermal projects under formal or preliminary review would have an estimated capacity to produce more than 21,000 MW of electricity — enough to power nearly 6.3 million homes.
Hammond said he would not expect that to change. Rather than ending renewable energy development, Willens and Hammond said they expect a Trump administration most likely would focus on permitting reforms that might actually result in moving large-scale renewable energy projects though the process more quickly.
“The type of energy project won’t matter if staff can’t get the permitting process solved for President Trump,” he said.
Race against time
Meanwhile, the clock is ticking as BLM continues reviewing dozens of solar, wind and geothermal power projects in the active and preliminary permitting pipeline.
It’s not clear how many of the 16 projects under active review will complete the permitting process.
“I doubt that they can all make it” through the permitting process year’s end, said Pat Parenteau, a professor of law emeritus and senior fellow for climate policy at the Vermont Law and Graduate School.
The administration is making progress. BLM issued a final environmental impact statement last month for the Libra Solar project in southwest Nevada, which would have the capacity to power roughly 210,000 homes.
David Spence, an expert on the law and politics of energy development at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin, said if the environmental review process “is completed and a license issued,” likely through a record of decision, “that’s a hard thing to reverse.”
But it’s not impossible, Spence said.
What’s more, he and others said the Trump administration could use the judicial system to halt approved projects.
The utility scale solar and wind projects approved over the next five months “will receive plenty of scrutiny from groups that may oppose their approval,” said Bret Birdsong, a professor and public lands expert at the William S. Boyd School of Law University of Nevada Las Vegas.
The result, Birdsong said, are lawsuits challenging the projects.
“When a project gets approved someone is going to challenge it in court,” Fox said. “When they do, the Department of Justice, representing the federal agencies, will vigorously defend that project review against judicial scrutiny. Would the Trump administration do that? Perhaps not. They may agree with the petitioners that oppose the solar project.”
In this scenario, BLM would seek to voluntarily remand an approved permit back to the agency for further review, “effectively halting the project,” he said.
“That is a fairly aggressive action, and courts typically do not like it when agencies change their positions based solely on the fact of a change in administration,” he added. “But they can.”
The Justice Department could also simply settle lawsuits challenging the projects.
The Biden administration used this to overturn Trump-era decisions involving the approval of new oil and gas leases, expanded grazing and recreation, and a multistate natural gas pipeline project.
Leshy, the former Clinton-era Interior solicitor, said he believes there’s enough momentum in place through policy action and market forces to keep the renewable energy industry moving forward, even if Trump gets four more years in office.
“While Trump has been verbally hostile to renewables, preferring more fossil fuels, acting on such verbiage will likely be very challenging,” he said. “The overall market, including utilities and private investors, is speaking louder than ever in favor of renewables.”
