Owens Lake Solar Updates

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (DWP) proposal to place photovoltaic panels on part of Owens Dry Lake and potentially solar thermal in southern Owens Valley, Inyo County, California. DWP wants to build a pilot project of 80 acres in an effort to control dust on the playa, but could expand in the future. DWP had dewatered the lake when it shipped much of the Owens River south to Los Angeles.

Owens Lake Project Overview

 

Owens Lake History

January 24, 2011 - Read the interesting essay by Karen Piper: "Dreams, Dust and Birds: The Trashing of Owens Lake."

In The Design Observer Group:

http://places.designobserver.com/entry.html?entry=23328

Southern Owens Valley Solar Ranch

October 10, 2010 - LADWP proposes more projects >>here.

LA Scales Back Solar Project

July 6, 2010 - Lone Pine, California — The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power's ambitious plan to put solar panels on 80 square miles of dry lake bed and flatlands east of the Sierra Nevada range has run into a daunting problem: extremely caustic mud in an area where it hoped to build an 80-acre pilot project.

Preliminary engineering tests show that if solar panel platforms were placed at the southern end of the nearly dry 110-square-mile Owens Lake, they would sink as much as several inches into extremely corrosive soil.

The DWP now plans a much more modest five-acre pilot project on firmer sandy soil at the north end of the lake.

Gale-force winds also posed an engineering problem.

See the Los Angeles Times.

 

Map of Potential Solar Areas

April, 2010 - Much of Owens Dry lake (which does fill with water at times) and Owens Valley northward past Lone Pint to Independance are potential solar energy zones.

The Green Cowboy Leaves DWP

April 12, 2010 - S. David Freeman, Interim General manager of the L.A. Department of Water and Power, who had been pushing for the Owens Lake Solar park, left the controversial water and electricity giant. He called for a "Green Revolution" to replace coal with renewable energy, but admitted that "it will require a mammoth investment of capital that will place upward pressure on electric rates" (see Our LA.org).

See also Ron Kaye L.A. blog.

March 3, 2010 perspective from Sustain Lane blog.

January 11, 2010 - Freeman visits Owens Valley - Mammoth Mountain Forums.

December 8, 2009 - DWP prsents plan to Inyo Supervisors - Sierra Wave.

^Owens Lake and southern Owens Valley from the Inyo Mountains, looking west towards the Sierra Nevada.

 

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