The U.S Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) plans to establish Renewable Energy Coordination Offices. The new offices are to expedite the permitting of wind, solar, biomass and geothermal projects along with needed electrical transmission facilities on BLM-managed lands. This is a step towards achieving Energy Policy Act of 2005, set to achieve 10,000 megawatts of non-hydropower renewable energy projects on public lands by 2015.
The offices will initially be located in states with maximum interest in renewable energy development: Arizona, California, Nevada and Wyoming. The new offices will receive staff support from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other bureaus within the Department of the Interior.
As per the order of the former Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne, the BLM director has been authorized to allocate resources that support the processing and permitting of renewable energy projects on public lands; to develop best environmental management practices for these projects; to recover costs in the processing of renewable energy applications; and to improve coordination with other federal agencies, including the Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as state agencies, to facilitate the processing and permitting of renewable energy projects on public lands.