A tragedy. Killing this and Revolution Wind are some of the most consequential acts of the Trump administration. We are now unable to do large scale grid-connected energy projects and won't be able to take advantage of the incredible advances in efficiency renewables provide. With data centers causing the first increase in per-capita energy usage in decades there's a good chance we have an actual power crisis and the administration's other priorities like reshoring manufacturing become impossible.
Yep. It has massive ripple effects for manufacturing, especially as more industry transitions away from fossils for heat generation. Energy accounts for around 40% of the opex for steel manufacturing, for instance. Zero chance we build more steel mills if the cost of electricity continues to skyrocket.
The Chinese have the right approach: Bringing the cost-per-watt down using massive deployments of renewables and ultra high voltage transmission. We were already in the backseat, and now we're not even in the same car.
In the UK, they didn't move to a zonal pricing system, which is generally considered a good move, because the uncertainty of even a good change to the system would spoon investors and affect interest rates and so lower the amount of renewables built and increase energy costs.
In the US they are actively causing chaos with much worse impacts likely.
Can't help but notice the reliable pattern of right-wing naming conventions. German Democratic Republic, not at all democratic. Democratic People's Republic of Korea, again not even remotely democratic. Make America Great Again, not in fact trying to make America great. I get it, slogans work and are more important than the reality behind them. But it is depressing nonetheless, to imagine all the nice things and prosperity we could create if we actually did try.
> "Conservation advocates, local government leaders and nearby residents have expressed concerns about the cumulative environmental impacts of the proposed Esmeralda 7 project, which in addition to covering a huge swath of desert lands would have also included miles of roads and associated transmission lines."
> "They have argued for placing onshore utility-scale projects on previously disturbed sites and expanding the use of rooftop solar."
> "The Esmeralda 7 project “would have destroyed significant archaeology sites, rare plants, bighorn sheep habitat and wilderness quality lands,” said Kevin Emmerich, a co-founder of Nevada-based Basin and Range Watch."
> "The cancellation of the project “will give us a chance to protect the tremendous resources of the area, including beautiful and wild mountain ranges and valleys, rare plant populations, and bighorn sheep,” said Laura Cunningham, a biologist with Western Watersheds Project."
> "“Paleontological fossil beds [the Esmeralda Formation] here were formative to understanding the geological history of the Great Basin,” Cunningham added. “This is good news for recreationists and for conservation efforts of an amazing landscape.”"
The project was given a waiver that allowed them to skip much of the endless environmental review process that makes energy projects so expensive in the US. This cancels that waiver.
The reasoning appears to be forcing politically-connected projects to be subject to the same environmental reviews as every other project, including other clean energy projects that are not politically connected. As a matter of principle I agree the rules should be uniformly applied.
If the environmental review process is that onerous, which it is, then we should reform the process for everyone rather than allow politically connected people buy waivers.
But they don't believe in solar which means they accidentally are making their claimed emergency worse and helping their fossil donors to make more money. Like Trump expressly promised to do in return for their donations.
“The BLM did not cancel the project. During routine discussions prior to the lapse in appropriations, the proponents and BLM agreed to change their approach for the Esmeralda 7 Solar Project in Nevada,” said an Interior spokesperson in an email Friday.
“Instead of pursuing a programmatic level environmental analysis, the applicants will now have the option to submit individual project proposals to the BLM to more effectively analyze potential impacts,” the email continued.
One of the consequences of being part of administration that lies constantly is that it is very difficult to trust they are telling the truth. Since this is based on the Interior Department saying something very different than the company, I'm disinclined to give the benefit of the doubt to the Interior.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has bragged he had Jared Kushner "in his pocket." Oil-producing middle-eastern countries, having made significant contributions to Trump family's wealth, have enormous influence over him. If you were the ruler of an oil-producing country and have enormous influence over Trump, what would you have him do for your country?
If it was me, this is what I would have him do: Pull out of the Paris climate accord, cancel renewable energy projects, cancel EV tax credits. Trump has done all that.
Mohammed bin Salman and Trump are in each other's pockets. One of Trump's first acts in his first term was to approve the sale of military equipment to Saudi Arabia for the first time. At the time, MBS was the defense minister, and was not the Crown Prince. Almost all western open source intelligence on the matter will state that this act alone was what convinced King Salman to remove Muhammad bin Nayef as Crown Prince, and install MBS in his stead. The deal closed in May, and MBS was made Crown Prince in June. MBS literally owes his role as future King to Donald Trump. Trump would later brag about protecting "our guy" after the whole world condemned him and wanted to cut ties to Saudi Arabia for killing Khashoggi. When MBS did his now infamous 2017 purge of Saudi Billionaires, imprisoning them in a hotel and confiscating their wealth or securing their loyalty, he was likely doing it with CIA-sourced intel, hand delivered by Kushner [0] who had finally received the necessary security clearances which the Trump administration directly intervened in issuing [1].
In October 2022, literally a week after meeting Putin for the first time, Elon Musk started mirroring Russian propaganda [2], even though he had been a staunch supporter of Ukraine until that point. A week later, he would announce that he had secured funding to buy Twitter. Immediately, he reversed course on his "Free Speech Absolutism" and started pumping out right wing propaganda. Not long after, he would announce that he was leaving the democratic party, and not long after that, he would endorse Trump, and then not long after that, he would begin campaigning with trump and becoming his single largest donor and chief election meddler.
When Musk was forced to disclose his investors, the list [3] included:
* the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia
* several Saudi hedge funds, including those owned by billionaires that miraculously survived the 2017 purge with their wealth intact.
* several Silicon Valley VCs who had recently announced raising significant funding from Saudi Arabia, including one that had just hired the sons of sanctioned Russian Oligarchs in Putin's inner circle [4].
* several individuals with ties to Saudi Arabia or Russia.
* (unrelated but hilarious and unsurprising) P Diddy, who knew he was in future need of a presidential pardon.
TL;DR: Mohammed bin Salman owes his position as Crown Prince to Donald Trump, and Donald Trump owes his second term to Mohammed bin Salman.
> The Interior Department in a statement Friday afternoon said that the solar developers and BLM had “agreed to change their approach for the Esmeralda 7 Solar Project in Nevada. Instead of pursuing a programmatic level environmental analysis, the applicants will now have the option to submit individual project proposals to the BLM to more effectively analyze potential impacts.”
What does this even mean? Why the hell does it have to be so hard to get anything done in this country?
> “Friends of Nevada Wilderness is thrilled that this poorly sited project is dead,” said Shaaron Netherton, the group’s executive director. “In the push to get this particular project through, the BLM ignored the importance of this region’s cultural significance, biological significance and the fact that it is one of the most intact landscapes remaining in Nevada,” Netherton added.
I will also save some ire for these people. This is literally desert wasteland sitting alongside a freeway. It's hard to believe that someone spent time and money on this cause.
> This is literally desert wasteland sitting alongside a freeway
"Desert wasteland" teems with life, just maybe not the kind that most people care about. Land use is one of the sticking points of the energy transition, both for agriculture and biodiversity.
One of the only plusses to nuclear power is reduced land use, though it has it's own water use and waste issues. Much better alternatives are rooftop solar and residential batteries, and grid scale batteries located closer to where they are needed for industry, commerce, and high-density housing. It really kills the need for these large scale deployments and the costly transmission lines to service them.
>What does this even mean? Why the hell does it have to be so hard to get anything done in this country?
Because some engineering specialty lobbyist wants it to be that way to drive business to his clients, he cooks up some narrative about how more review will save the planet and HN takes it at face value.
You see this crap with every sort of permitting. Except perhaps in the rare cases it constrains the biggest entities (e.g. DuPont dumping crap in the river or whatever) all these BS processes and requirements do is raise the richness floor of who can play the game. The BigCos can pay for the pretexts to get the permission they need to keep doing whatever, free from the competition from everyone down-market who can't afford that.
If you look deeply into it, it would not surprise me to learn that some kind of natural gas industry group bankrolls these activists.
Of course maybe I’m overthinking it and assuming a conspiracy where stupidity is a simpler explanation. There were climate activists protesting wind farms in Germany.
Not talking about Trump here, as I very much doubt he cares about jack shit. Some conservationists are happy that the project was canceled. Sure, the best place to put solar is probably on top of existing structures, not in "one of the most intact landscapes remaining" in the area (if that is even true). But what if just roofs isn't realistic, or just not enough? Could they have chosen a better site from an ecological perspective? Did someone deliberately choose the site to pit one kind of environmentalist against another kind of environmentalist? When you try and think like a politician whose only objective is to "look good" to different camps at the same time, it doesn't seem that outlandish an idea. I'd just like to tell the conservationists that mining coal or oil isn't exactly great for the landscape and animals in the mine's area either, and burning it is bad for all kinds of ecosystems around the world.
but at a certain point in time -- there are facts you can't dispute. utility solar is one of the cheapest forms of energy there is. & a massive plus when you consider places like arizona.
>"The American president has called renewable energy projects a “scam”."
The rest of the world considers Trump and his administration 'a scam', and aren't falling for it. The side effects of all the bullshit they've pulled and continue to pull is that the rest of the world is playing together more nicely with one another, and the US is screwing over their own economy for the longer term.
Sounds like a technical reason. It's apparently 7 projects combined and the Biden administration let them file one enviromental impact assessment instead of 7 sepearate ones. That sounds banal to me, so maybe other people could explain why (if) it's important. It makes sense that Biden would cut a lot of red tape for something that's percieved to be good for the enviroment (a bit ironic in this case) but the Trump administration, who is skeptical about the claimed benefits of renewables are not so impressed. I hope some knowledgeable people can expand on it because some technical and economic analysis would be appreciated.
Just for the record i know Trump is corrupt, a felon, impeached etc etc. and it's pointless to attribute any decisions he or his minions make to reasons any normal person would describe as "rational" or anything other then serving his own interests. So please don't bother mentioning it again thank you. There, now i've cut the discussion thread by 75%.
Solar may be intermittent but tons of electrical usage can be made intermittent thus freeing capacity for non intermittent uses. I'm so tired of these arguments.
Trump claims to want to bring back manufacturing. Manufacturing is material inputs plus labor or automation. American labor is expensive. The only way to compete is automation.
Time and time again studies show that energy cost is the main determinant of factory output and manufacturing capacity. Cheap energy equals more stuff. That's basically it. Anyone who is canceling energy projects is not brining back manufacturing.
We honestly need the next administration to shut down our coal- and oil-fired power plants, and shut down our coal mines. Physically ensure they can't be restarted.
With the precedents handed down from Trump, that could likely be concluded before the courts have a chance to weigh in. The owners will be entitled to cash damages. But the industries will have been politically destroyed.
(Note: leave natural gas alone. It’s cheap and relatively clean. It’s also geopolitical export currency.)
While in understand where you are coming from, I don't think we should completely destroy coal mines. They should be kept around as a backup.
That said, I would be 100% onboard with a future administration applying a massive tax on the wealthy to fund solar plants, rooftops, and wind energy - 100% paid for by the wealthy who are profiting from this administration at the expense of our lives.
From what I can tell by reading the BLM and related documents, this is not canceling the solar farm. That misrepresents the situation.
The project was given preferential treatment by Biden, allowing them to skip environmental review process required for other energy projects on BLM land in Nevada. This is canceling the preferential treatment, forcing them to do the environmental review to the same standard as other energy projects in Nevada, with the costs implied.
Geothermal energy projects in Nevada have been buried in endless environmental reviews by Democrat administrations for decades. It smells a lot like patronage to selectively waive environmental review requirements for preferred energy projects. There may be an "own the libs" aspect to it but that isn't the story.
If the normal environmental review process doesn't serve a real purpose or makes these energy projects infeasibly expensive then we should be reducing and reforming the environmental review process, not letting administrations decide which energy projects are subject to it.
I’m surprised people are up in arms about this here. First, there has been huge protests about the selling, er “leasing”, of BLM land to millionaires. Do they even realize what was happening here?
The headline would be better written as “some rich guy no longer gets to skip normal environmental procedures for permanently occupying public land”.
Public land should remain that way, forever. Stop selling our children’s future for profit, no matter the cause.
[+] [-] jauntywundrkind|5 months ago|reply
6.2GW is huge. What an incredible sad loss.
Meanwhile there is a beautiful article showing in photos China's recent 16.2GW solar install Talatan in the Qinghai Province. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/10/business/china-solar-tibe...
[+] [-] nextworddev|5 months ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] clarionPilot11|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] frogperson|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] tempera|5 months ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] paraboli|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] alexose|5 months ago|reply
The Chinese have the right approach: Bringing the cost-per-watt down using massive deployments of renewables and ultra high voltage transmission. We were already in the backseat, and now we're not even in the same car.
[+] [-] ZeroGravitas|5 months ago|reply
In the US they are actively causing chaos with much worse impacts likely.
[+] [-] ManuelKiessling|5 months ago|reply
At the same time, these AI companies currently have insanely deep pockets and mindshare, and I assume they are lobbying hard for cheap energy?
[+] [-] rootusrootus|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] xutopia|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] perihelions|5 months ago|reply
> "Conservation advocates, local government leaders and nearby residents have expressed concerns about the cumulative environmental impacts of the proposed Esmeralda 7 project, which in addition to covering a huge swath of desert lands would have also included miles of roads and associated transmission lines."
> "They have argued for placing onshore utility-scale projects on previously disturbed sites and expanding the use of rooftop solar."
> "The Esmeralda 7 project “would have destroyed significant archaeology sites, rare plants, bighorn sheep habitat and wilderness quality lands,” said Kevin Emmerich, a co-founder of Nevada-based Basin and Range Watch."
> "The cancellation of the project “will give us a chance to protect the tremendous resources of the area, including beautiful and wild mountain ranges and valleys, rare plant populations, and bighorn sheep,” said Laura Cunningham, a biologist with Western Watersheds Project."
> "“Paleontological fossil beds [the Esmeralda Formation] here were formative to understanding the geological history of the Great Basin,” Cunningham added. “This is good news for recreationists and for conservation efforts of an amazing landscape.”"
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/10/trump-interior-depa...
[+] [-] jandrewrogers|5 months ago|reply
The reasoning appears to be forcing politically-connected projects to be subject to the same environmental reviews as every other project, including other clean energy projects that are not politically connected. As a matter of principle I agree the rules should be uniformly applied.
If the environmental review process is that onerous, which it is, then we should reform the process for everyone rather than allow politically connected people buy waivers.
[+] [-] nine_zeros|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] ZeroGravitas|5 months ago|reply
https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/decl...
But they don't believe in solar which means they accidentally are making their claimed emergency worse and helping their fossil donors to make more money. Like Trump expressly promised to do in return for their donations.
[+] [-] xnx|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] aauchter|5 months ago|reply
“Instead of pursuing a programmatic level environmental analysis, the applicants will now have the option to submit individual project proposals to the BLM to more effectively analyze potential impacts,” the email continued.
https://www.rgj.com/story/news/2025/10/13/trump-nv-solar-pro...
[+] [-] two_handfuls|5 months ago|reply
> On Thursday, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) canceled an environmental review of the Esmeralda Seven Solar Project
[+] [-] cjensen|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] perihelions|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] breadwinner|5 months ago|reply
If it was me, this is what I would have him do: Pull out of the Paris climate accord, cancel renewable energy projects, cancel EV tax credits. Trump has done all that.
In fact Trump went a step further:
Trump is using tariffs to pressure other countries to relax their pledges to fight climate change and instead burn more oil, gas and coal. See: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/27/climate/trump-internation...
[+] [-] unknown|5 months ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] darksaints|5 months ago|reply
In October 2022, literally a week after meeting Putin for the first time, Elon Musk started mirroring Russian propaganda [2], even though he had been a staunch supporter of Ukraine until that point. A week later, he would announce that he had secured funding to buy Twitter. Immediately, he reversed course on his "Free Speech Absolutism" and started pumping out right wing propaganda. Not long after, he would announce that he was leaving the democratic party, and not long after that, he would endorse Trump, and then not long after that, he would begin campaigning with trump and becoming his single largest donor and chief election meddler.
When Musk was forced to disclose his investors, the list [3] included:
* the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia
* several Saudi hedge funds, including those owned by billionaires that miraculously survived the 2017 purge with their wealth intact.
* several Silicon Valley VCs who had recently announced raising significant funding from Saudi Arabia, including one that had just hired the sons of sanctioned Russian Oligarchs in Putin's inner circle [4].
* several individuals with ties to Saudi Arabia or Russia.
* (unrelated but hilarious and unsurprising) P Diddy, who knew he was in future need of a presidential pardon.
TL;DR: Mohammed bin Salman owes his position as Crown Prince to Donald Trump, and Donald Trump owes his second term to Mohammed bin Salman.
[0] https://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-crown-prince-jared-kus...
[1] https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/437292-kushners-...
[2] https://www.npr.org/2022/10/04/1126714896/elon-musk-ukraine-...
[3] https://finance.yahoo.com/news/x-investors-helped-elon-musk-...
[4] https://www.aa.com.tr/en/science-technology/x-shareholders-l...
[+] [-] jauntywundrkind|5 months ago|reply
The 6.2 GW here would have been significant.
[+] [-] legitster|5 months ago|reply
What does this even mean? Why the hell does it have to be so hard to get anything done in this country?
> “Friends of Nevada Wilderness is thrilled that this poorly sited project is dead,” said Shaaron Netherton, the group’s executive director. “In the push to get this particular project through, the BLM ignored the importance of this region’s cultural significance, biological significance and the fact that it is one of the most intact landscapes remaining in Nevada,” Netherton added.
I will also save some ire for these people. This is literally desert wasteland sitting alongside a freeway. It's hard to believe that someone spent time and money on this cause.
[+] [-] aeonfox|5 months ago|reply
"Desert wasteland" teems with life, just maybe not the kind that most people care about. Land use is one of the sticking points of the energy transition, both for agriculture and biodiversity.
One of the only plusses to nuclear power is reduced land use, though it has it's own water use and waste issues. Much better alternatives are rooftop solar and residential batteries, and grid scale batteries located closer to where they are needed for industry, commerce, and high-density housing. It really kills the need for these large scale deployments and the costly transmission lines to service them.
[+] [-] potato3732842|5 months ago|reply
Because some engineering specialty lobbyist wants it to be that way to drive business to his clients, he cooks up some narrative about how more review will save the planet and HN takes it at face value.
You see this crap with every sort of permitting. Except perhaps in the rare cases it constrains the biggest entities (e.g. DuPont dumping crap in the river or whatever) all these BS processes and requirements do is raise the richness floor of who can play the game. The BigCos can pay for the pretexts to get the permission they need to keep doing whatever, free from the competition from everyone down-market who can't afford that.
[+] [-] dpe82|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] api|5 months ago|reply
Of course maybe I’m overthinking it and assuming a conspiracy where stupidity is a simpler explanation. There were climate activists protesting wind farms in Germany.
[+] [-] qiqitori|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] zoklet-enjoyer|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] gnabgib|5 months ago|reply
An Immense Solar Project Just Got Canceled Under Trump (11 points, 5 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45542159
Trump administration has killed a massive solar power project in Nevada (15 points, 8 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45540426
[+] [-] dzonga|5 months ago|reply
but at a certain point in time -- there are facts you can't dispute. utility solar is one of the cheapest forms of energy there is. & a massive plus when you consider places like arizona.
so what's trump admin endgame ?
[+] [-] sixothree|5 months ago|reply
Cruelty and revenge
[+] [-] doener|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] partomniscient|5 months ago|reply
The rest of the world considers Trump and his administration 'a scam', and aren't falling for it. The side effects of all the bullshit they've pulled and continue to pull is that the rest of the world is playing together more nicely with one another, and the US is screwing over their own economy for the longer term.
[+] [-] greenavocado|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] FridayoLeary|5 months ago|reply
Just for the record i know Trump is corrupt, a felon, impeached etc etc. and it's pointless to attribute any decisions he or his minions make to reasons any normal person would describe as "rational" or anything other then serving his own interests. So please don't bother mentioning it again thank you. There, now i've cut the discussion thread by 75%.
[+] [-] anon291|5 months ago|reply
Trump claims to want to bring back manufacturing. Manufacturing is material inputs plus labor or automation. American labor is expensive. The only way to compete is automation.
Time and time again studies show that energy cost is the main determinant of factory output and manufacturing capacity. Cheap energy equals more stuff. That's basically it. Anyone who is canceling energy projects is not brining back manufacturing.
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|5 months ago|reply
With the precedents handed down from Trump, that could likely be concluded before the courts have a chance to weigh in. The owners will be entitled to cash damages. But the industries will have been politically destroyed.
(Note: leave natural gas alone. It’s cheap and relatively clean. It’s also geopolitical export currency.)
[+] [-] cmxch|5 months ago|reply
Not government checks, but from the private industry that displaces coal/oil.
[+] [-] nine_zeros|5 months ago|reply
That said, I would be 100% onboard with a future administration applying a massive tax on the wealthy to fund solar plants, rooftops, and wind energy - 100% paid for by the wealthy who are profiting from this administration at the expense of our lives.
[+] [-] lovich|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] kayodelycaon|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] lesuorac|5 months ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] jandrewrogers|5 months ago|reply
The project was given preferential treatment by Biden, allowing them to skip environmental review process required for other energy projects on BLM land in Nevada. This is canceling the preferential treatment, forcing them to do the environmental review to the same standard as other energy projects in Nevada, with the costs implied.
Geothermal energy projects in Nevada have been buried in endless environmental reviews by Democrat administrations for decades. It smells a lot like patronage to selectively waive environmental review requirements for preferred energy projects. There may be an "own the libs" aspect to it but that isn't the story.
If the normal environmental review process doesn't serve a real purpose or makes these energy projects infeasibly expensive then we should be reducing and reforming the environmental review process, not letting administrations decide which energy projects are subject to it.
[+] [-] myvoiceismypass|5 months ago|reply
This administration has literally stated this goal out loud.
Anything that Biden did, anything that Obama did = bad. That’s it. That’s all.
[+] [-] renewiltord|5 months ago|reply
[+] [-] exabrial|5 months ago|reply
The headline would be better written as “some rich guy no longer gets to skip normal environmental procedures for permanently occupying public land”.
Public land should remain that way, forever. Stop selling our children’s future for profit, no matter the cause.