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Solar is Booming in the California Desert, if Water Issues Don’t Get in the Way
Utility-scale solar farms spreading rapidly across the desert Southwest are stressing the region’s already overtaxed groundwater and communities are beginning to push back.
By Wyatt Myskow
DESERT CENTER, Calif.—Solar farms stretch out mile after mile along Interstate 10 around Palm Springs, creating one of the densest areas of solar development in North America in the heart of California’s Colorado Desert. But the area’s success in meeting the state and the nation’s renewable energy goals is running up against the Southwest’s biggest climate challenge: Having enough water.