Again, inexplicably, Obama has failed to take credit for a great achievement: pre-approving 250,000 acres of federal lands for solar energy projects, while Romney's beating him up in the debates for not opening up Yellowstone Park and the Arctic Wildlife Reserve to fracking and strip mining.
Under Obama, the Interior Department didn't go project-by-project, or site-by-site, it looked at all federal public lands, did a programmatic environmental impact assessment of all of them, narrowed down the choices, got public feedback at several intervals, and then pre-approved any big solar energy projects in six states.
Because the public was involved, there won't be any litigation or protests by environmental groups. Approval time and risk will be reduced for solar entrepreneurs. Everybody has had their say and is on board. That's how public management should be done, not by politicians striking secret deals in backrooms with Big Business!
By Flora Lichtman
October 19, 2012 | NPR
URL: http://n.pr/T35FhA
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