I am writing today to announce the closure of the New Mexico Independent. After three and a half years of operation in New Mexico, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news…
While environmental activists played their part yesterday during demonstrations at the capitol building, going so far as to dress up as solar panels and to sing the tune of “You Are My Sunshine,” their counterparts, the anti-cap-and-trade contingency who has…
Roughly one quarter of University of New Mexico students are unimpressed with the state’s flagship public school, according to a survey that questioned college students about their higher education experiences.
Jemez Pueblo is about to build a utility scale solar-plant, the Associated Press reported Wednesday. Other tribes around the country have developed wind farms, but this would be first commercial solar plant on tribal land.
The four mega-watt solar plant would be on a 30-acre site with 14,850 solar panels, providing enough electricity for about 600 homes. It’s being funded with a package of government loans, grants and tax credits, and will cost about $22 million. It’s expected to generate about $25 million in revenue for the 3,000 member tribe over the next 25 years, which would be significant.
James Roger Madalena, a former tribal governor who now represents the pueblo in the state Legislature, told the AP the it was important for the Pueblo to find ways of bringing in money.
Noting that many tribes are poverty stricken with high unemployment rates, the AP described the potential of renewable energy for generating revenue for tribal communities:
Indian tribes control more than 55 million acres of land across the nation, and those lands are capable of producing an estimated 535 billion kilowatt hours of electricity per year from wind power, according to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Tribal Energy Program. Solar has even greater promise, at 17 trillion kilowatt hours per year, or more than four times the amount of electricity generated annually in the U.S.
“There’s huge potential,” said Jerry Pardilla, executive director of the National Tribal Environmental Council.
