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Economic Potential of Wind and Solar in American Indian Communities

Abstract

Could renewable energy development on American Indian Reservations alleviate poverty? This Article combines data on wind and solar endowments, reservation characteristics, and utility-scale renewable energy projects to offer three insights. First, the colonial process of reservation creation that intentionally deprived tribes of other natural resources unintentionally left them with favorable wind and solar, especially on reservations with the lowest-income populations. Second, despite favorable endowments, renewable projects are rare: reservation lands are 46% less likely to host wind farms and 110% less likely to host solar than comparable adjacent lands. Third, if this disparity persists, tribes may forgo over $19 billion in lease and tax earnings that could be accrued under forecasts of renewable energy demand through 2050. We highlight barriers—such as regulatory complexity and uncertainty—that help explain this disparity and emphasize this is not a call to impose federal energy priorities on unwilling tribes.

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Written By
  • Dominic Parker
    Dominic Parker
    • Senior Fellow

    Dominic (Nick) Parker, is a PERC senior fellow as well as director of PERC’s summer fellowship program. Nick is also a professor of applied economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he serves in editorial roles for three leading academic journals in environmental and resource economics.

  • Sarah Johnston
    • Lone Mountain Fellow

    Sarah Johnston is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

  • Bryan Leonard
    • Fellowship Director,
    • Senior Fellow

    Bryan Leonard is an associate professor of environmental and natural resource economics in the School of Sustainability and a faculty affiliate in the Economics Department and the Center for Behavior, Institutions, and the Environment at Arizona State University. He is also a senior fellow at PERC, a PERC fellowship director, and a 2017 and 2018 PERC Lone Mountain Fellow. 

  • Daniel Stewart

    Daniel Stewart is a professor of entrepreneurship and director of the Hogan Entrepreneur Center at Gonzaga University.

  • Justin Winikoff
    • Graduate Fellow

    Justin Winikoff is a research agricultural Eeconomist in the Rural Economy Branch of the USDA Economic Research Service.

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