Editorial: Clean energy on parade

Monday, April 23, 2007 | 7:35 a.m.

The time is now right for Nevada to gain national prominence in renewable energy

A large solar energy project at Nellis Air Force Base that made news in Nevada a month ago made news in USA Today last week. "Air Force embraces solar power," the newspaper's headline read.

With all the intense sunshine received here, this is the kind of national attention that Nevada businesses, governments and facilities should receive more often. Nevada is ideal for solar projects and the timing is right.

"Green is the new red, white and blue," wrote author and columnist Thomas Friedman in the cover story of The New York Times Magazine a week ago.

He's right, in the sense that going green has transcended environmentalism. Entrepreneurs are seeing profits . And there's a national security angle. " ... Americans were starting to realize we were financing both sides in the war on terrorism," Friedman wrote. "We were financing the U.S. military with our tax dollars; and we were financing a transformation of Islam, in favor of its most intolerant strand, with our gasoline purchases."

Suddenly, with these kinds of realizations, green projects are picking up across the country, mostly because of visionary leadership at state levels.

Two years ago the Nevada Legislature mandated that power companies in the state get 20 percent of their energy from renewable sources by 2015. This has helped bring about the solar project at Nellis, which is to begin operating by year's end, and another large solar facility in Boulder City, which is to begin operating at month's end.

Most other states have incentives for green industries, too. The latest to unveil a plan is New York, where Gov. Eliot Spitzer on Thursday announced a goal of reducing power consumption 15 percent by 2015. Included in his vision are new cleaner-burning power plants and tougher efficiency standards for buildings, appliances and furnaces, according to Bloomberg News.

At Nellis the new solar facility on 140 acres is being financed mostly by private California companies whose investments are augmented by state and federal subsidies.

When operating, the plant will provide 30 percent of the base's power, with some of its output being purchased by Nevada Power to help the utility meet the legislative mandate on renewable energy.

Last week the Assembly unanimously passed a bill to let homeowners significantly increase the energy they can draw from rooftop solar panels.

We hope such legislation proliferates, so the state can maintain its momentum in this now-friendly environment for renewable energy enterprises.