Green Energy Is Coming for the Desert
Trump’s Bureau of Land Management is pushing to aggressively expand solar farms into the Mojave Desert, which advocates say would decimate its vast biodiversity. The post Green Energy Is Coming for the Desert appeared first on The Intercept .
In the Mojave Desert, two activists, Kevin Emmerich and Laura Cunningham, are fighting against two major solar projects proposed on BLM-managed lands. They are worried that these projects will destroy the desert ecology and bring little benefit to the local community. Cunningham, a wildlife biologist and desert tortoise researcher, points out that deserts, including the Mojave, sequester up to 28% of land-based carbon, playing an important role in absorbing climate-warming carbon.
She warns that building solar farms in these habitats would actually contribute to climate change by crushing lichens, shrubs, and flowers and releasing carbon. Emmerich echoes these concerns, emphasizing that deserts have a high potential for carbon sequestration due to the roots of creosote plants, which absorb carbon from the atmosphere and convert it into oxygen.
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- Green Energy Is Coming for the Desert theintercept.com
