Sacrificing the desert to save the Earth

[XemaSab]

29. I have a problem with destroying open space in order to save it.

Let's play with some numbers:

If 6 square miles of desert is enough to power 140,000 homes during peak hours, then each square mile can power about 23,300 homes. (Annoyingly, the article doesn't say whether "peak hours" means peak generation for the plant, or peak use for the state. But whatever.)

If there are 12,392,852 households in California, then it will take about 532 square miles of land to power all the homes in the state. (Let's ignore businesses and charging cars for right now.)

These are the 20 largest cities in California by land area:

The city of LA has an area of 469 square miles.
The city of San Diego has an area of 325 square miles.
San Jose has an area of 177 square miles.
Bakersfield has an area of 142 square miles.
The city of Fresno has an area of 112 square miles.
Palmdale has an area of 106 square miles.
The city of Sacramento has an area of 98 square miles.
Lancaster has an area of 94 square miles.
Palm Springs has an area of 94 square miles.
Riverside has an area of 81 square miles.
Fremont has an area of 77 square miles.
Apple Valley, Victorville, and Hesperia both have areas of 73 square miles.
Irvine has an area of 66 square miles.
Stockton has an area of 62 square miles.
Redding has an area of 60 square miles.
Oakland has an area of 56 square miles.
Thousand Oaks has a land area of 55 square miles.
Santa Clarita has a land area of 53 square miles.

These 20 cities have a total land area of 2,346 square miles.

Even if only 1/10th of the land area in these cities is suitable for solar, that's almost half of what we need.

In addition to the land available in cities, there are about 312 square miles on the west side of the San Joaquin valley that are no longer suitable for growing crops. This area is very sunny, and it would be perfect for solar farms.

In summary, I think we should exhaust all our other options before we develop wild areas. The only reason these wild areas are first on the chopping block is that land is cheap there and investors can make a quick buck.