The Associated Press reports that “State and federal officials sought Tuesday to bring order to California’s boom for renewable-energy plants in the Mojave and other southern California deserts, releasing a roadmap covering 22.5 million acres that designates some areas for large-scale solar, wind and geothermal plants and others for conservation of desert habitat and animals.”  

“’We have amazingly special places here,’ U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a news conference at a desert wind farm near Palm Springs with U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer and other officials releasing the multi-agency draft plan.”  

“By taking a look at the desert as a whole, Jewell said, the plan’s designers are ensuring ‘the areas that should be protected are set aside. The areas that should be developed are streamlined’ for building utility-scale renewable energy plants.”