How a Chicago-sized wind farm beat the odds and powered on

North America’s largest wind farm spun to life this spring in New Mexico. The farm is almost as large as Chicago and able to bring energy to homes as far away as California. However, it nearly didn’t come to fruition: “[SunZia] spanned five presidential administrations, an ownership change, a major reroute, and a standoff with a U.S. military base,” Sara Herschander writes for Grist. Now, the project serves as a poster child for permitting reform, and in an energy-hungry nation, could serve as a blueprint for future clean energy projects.

After gaining approval in 2006, “for the next 17 years, SunZia flailed, never even breaking ground. It ping-ponged between financial and regulatory purgatories that most commentators have attributed to endless permitting delays. There were, for example, a few state-level permitting debacles, with New Mexico rejecting SunZia’s initial transmission route in 2018. Even after such interstate power lines get federal approval, they often need to wait years longer for approvals from every state in which their project passes,” Grist reports.

Refusing to give up, SunZia applied for a new federal permit and won approval within two years. After earning $11 billion in funding, and spending a few years constructing the farm, developers finally switched on the turbines. The project has a mixed relationship with the surrounding area: During construction, developer Pattern Energy moved power lines to reserve airspace for migratory birds. However, it did not change the power lines’ route through sacred Indigenous land in New Mexico, a lawsuit regarding which remains pending.