Trump policy prompts NV Energy to seek escape hatch for would-be clean energy transmitters

By Dana Gentry

Nevada Current

NV Energy is asking federal regulators for permission to let renewable energy clients out of their transmission agreements without penalty following President Donald Trump’s evisceration of clean energy tax credits for projects on federal land.

Trump’s policies, according to NV Energy’s July 28 waiver request, “may have created significant challenges for solar and wind developers, especially for projects on land controlled by the Bureau of Land Management.”

“The request suggests that developers may abandon renewable energy projects that are no longer feasible,” Utility Dive reported Tuesday. “Projects with solar or wind components make up nearly 80 percent of NV Energy’s interconnection queue.”

In a filing Monday with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), two trade groups, Solar Energy Industries Association and the Interwest Energy Alliance, said NV Energy’s requested waiver would “encourage now-uncertain projects to withdraw from the queue or terminate their projects quickly, without penalty and with rapid return of their commercial deposits.”

NV Energy is seeking a one-time, 60-day window to allow interconnection customers to withdraw without penalty.

The waiver sought by NV Energy is necessary, the utility and the trade groups argue, because of Trump policies such as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and an executive order and Department of Interior memo issued in the wake of the bill’s passage.

The OBBB, billed as a cost-cutting measure for Americans, eliminates or phases out a number of clean energy tax credits enacted by the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, and is expected to increase energy prices and reduce investment in renewables.

As a result of Trump’s policy, Nevada’s annual gross domestic product (GDP) is projected to “shrink by $1 billion in 2030 and $1.5 billion in 2035. Between 2025 and 2034 — the Reconciliation budget window — cumulative GDP would shrink by $8 billion in Nevada,” according to a state-by-state analysis from Energy Innovation, a nonpartisan think tank.

The July 15 DOI memo requires that both the deputy secretary and secretary of the Interior personally review “every decision, action, consultation, and other undertaking” related to solar and wind development on federal land under BLM management, which is most of the state, NV Energy wrote.

“The purpose of this waiver request is thus both to clear the queue to the extent possible and avoid unneeded disputes, by providing a benefit to those willing to leave the queue,” the utility said in its filing.

Trump’s phasing out and elimination of clean energy credits could leave a void in NV Energy’s anticipated load for Greenlink, a $4.2 billion transmission line project regulated by FERC. The utility hopes its effort to clear the decks of unworkable projects could pave the path for those that remain viable.

“The rapid return of commercial deposits may also allow renewable developers to focus their development efforts on their projects that may be able to obtain tax credits, are not solar or wind and sited on federal land, or on their projects that remain viable because they are needed to meet state renewable standards, regardless of the changed economics.”

NV Energy did not respond to questions about the impact of scrapped energy projects on Greenlink.

Earlier this month, Gov. Joe Lombardo wrote to Secretary of the Interior Doug Burghum complaining that “solar projects deep in the project pipeline have been frozen” by the administration’s announcements. The governor mentioned three NV Energy solar projects in the works that would “immediately support our growing economy and electrical grid reliance.”

Lombardo, who singled out the energy needs of Nevada’s mining and data center industries, told Burghum he’s confident the two can work to “ensure Nevada’s ability to tap into one of its most abundant energy resources — solar energy — while meeting the Trump Administration’s goal of avoiding preferential treatment in federal permitting processes.”

The governor’s office did not answer when asked if Burghum responded.

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Dana Gentry is a native Las Vegan and award-winning investigative journalist. She is a graduate of Bishop Gorman High School and holds a Bachelor's degree in Communications from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.