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The Government Put a Data Center on Public Land — by Reusing a Solar Permit.
The same investigation, restaged one beat at a time. Drive it with the arrow keys, space, or autoplay. Nothing is cut from the piece — long runs are split across frames. Read the full investigation or open the Return on Investment hub.
The Government Put a Data Center on Public Land — by Reusing a Solar Permit.
In June 2026 the Trump administration's Bureau of Land Management approved a 167-MW data center in Nevada's Eldorado Valley — reported as the first on BLM-managed public land — by carrying a 2023 solar right-of-way onto the new project, so there was no fresh environmental review and no public comment. A public asset handed to a private energy hedge fund.
A federal agency handed a hedge fund the first data center on BLM public land — and reused a solar permit so the public never got to weigh in.
What the record establishes (FACT): the June 26, 2026 BLM approval of the 167-MW Townsite Data Center on Eldorado Valley public land; its reporting as the first on BLM-managed public land; the Determination of NEPA Adequacy that carried the 2023 Townsite Solar 2 review onto the data center with no new comment; the July 26-27 IBLA appeal by the Center for Biological Diversity, the Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter, and Boulder City; Rep. Tlaib's H.R. 9939; the tortoise habitat and Colorado River water. What is PROBABLY TRUE: that the applicant is Bill Perkins's Skylar Capital (the ROW holder of record is a Houston-energy-fund subsidiary; strong match, fund not the man). What is SOME SMOKE: the appellants' conclusion that the DNA-reuse was unlawful under NEPA — a real, documentable claim in an active appeal, not adjudicated. What we refuse: to declare the sidestep illegal before the IBLA rules; to assert Perkins personally applied; to assert the '~$500M AUM' figure (dropped); to claim the facility serves surveillance.
From a solar permit to a data-center approval to a stacked appeal.
What the record establishes — the approval and the reused permit.
- On June 26, 2026 the BLM approved an amended right-of-way for the Townsite Data Center (up to 167 MW) on roughly 85-88 acres of federal public land in Nevada's Eldorado Valley — reported by Electrek and the Center for Biological Diversity as the first data center on BLM-managed public land.
- Rather than run a fresh environmental review with public comment, the BLM issued a Determination of NEPA Adequacy that reused the 2023 Townsite Solar 2 right-of-way (a 19-MW solar project with a 35-MW battery), finding the earlier review 'adequate for the new proposed action' and the projects 'substantially the same.'
- On July 26-27, 2026 the Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter filed an IBLA appeal seeking a stay, and Boulder City voted unanimously to file its own appeal. The site is desert tortoise habitat; the water comes from the over-allocated Colorado River Basin.
“[The prior review's] public involvement and interagency review... is adequate for the new proposed action.”
This is why the sidestep is a documented FACT, not merely the appellants' allegation: the reuse of a 19-MW solar review to approve a 167-MW data center — with no new public comment — is in the agency's own record. What remains SOME SMOKE is only the legal conclusion that this was unlawful under NEPA, which the Interior Board of Land Appeals has yet to rule on.
The permit-reuse was an unlawful sidestep of NEPA's environmental-review and public-comment requirements.
This is the appellants' contested legal conclusion, held apart from the documented mechanism. The Center for Biological Diversity, the Sierra Club Toiyabe Chapter, and Boulder City argue the Determination of NEPA Adequacy was an improper shortcut that denied the public any review of a 167-MW industrial facility on public land in tortoise habitat drawing Colorado-River water. That is a serious, specific claim anchored to a formal IBLA filing and joined by the affected municipality — a real documentable thread. But it is unadjudicated: no tribunal has ruled the DNA-reuse unlawful, and agencies do use DNAs lawfully. So the mechanism is FACT; the illegality is SOME SMOKE until the IBLA rules.
The applicant traces to Skylar Capital Management, the Houston energy-trading hedge fund founded by Bill Perkins.
The right-of-way holder of record is 'Townsite Solar 2,' described by the Review-Journal as a subsidiary of a Texas-based hedge fund. Skylar Energy Resources is reported as a subsidiary of Skylar Capital Management, a Houston firm focused on natural gas and power; the Center for Biological Diversity attributes the project to Skylar Capital Management; and Bill Perkins founded Skylar Capital, a Houston energy-focused hedge fund, in 2012. The name, base, and sector make this a strong entity match — but we found no document tying Perkins personally to signing or directing the BLM application, so we attribute the fund and grade the identification PROBABLY TRUE, not FACT. (The intake's '~$500M AUM' figure is dropped as unverifiable.)
Rep. Rashida Tlaib introduced H.R. 9939, the 'No AI Data Centers on Federal Lands Act,' on July 23, 2026.
H.R. 9939, sponsored by Rep. Rashida Tlaib, was introduced July 23, 2026 'To prohibit Artificial Intelligence Data Centers on Federal land' — the direct legislative response to the precedent the Townsite approval sets, and confirmation of the 'week of July 20' framing in the intake.
The agency calls the projects 'substantially the same.' The appellants call it a skipped review. The documented facts sit between the spin.
- The data center is a like-for-like successor to an already-reviewed solar project on the same footprint, so a fresh NEPA review was unnecessary.
- The 2023 analysis is 'adequate'; the projects share acreage, boundaries, and construction timelines.
- A Determination of NEPA Adequacy is a real, lawful agency tool.
- The BLM did make that finding in writing (FACT) — but a 19-MW solar-and-battery project and a 167-MW data center differ enormously in power, water, and cooling load.
- The appeal is real, specific, and joined by Boulder City — so the sidestep-happened facts are FACT.
- What the record does NOT yet let us do is call the sidestep unlawful — that is the IBLA's question, so the illegality stays SOME SMOKE.
Whether the DNA-reuse was unlawful under NEPA, whether Bill Perkins personally directed the application, and Skylar's exact assets under management, are held out of fact or dropped.
Three threads are not asserted. The unlawfulness of the sidestep is the appellants' contested legal theory, pending before the Interior Board of Land Appeals — held at SOME SMOKE, while the mechanism itself is FACT. Bill Perkins's personal role in the application is not documented; the ROW holder of record is the Townsite Solar 2 subsidiary, so we attribute his Skylar Capital fund (PROBABLY TRUE), not the man. And the intake's '~$500M AUM as of 2023' figure is dropped as unverifiable — Wikipedia supports only $102M raised in 2012. Residents' warnings of rate hikes, water contamination, and property-value loss are carried as attributed warnings, not proven harms.
Help us fill it →Why it matters now.
The Return on Investment hub tracks the machinery by which public assets move to private hands while public costs are socialized. The Townsite Data Center is the literal version: federal land and scarce Colorado River water handed to a private energy hedge fund for AI-compute infrastructure, with the environmental-review-and-comment step skipped by reusing an old solar permit. It also connects to this project's surveillance work — data centers are the physical layer beneath the AI and surveillance stack — though we do not assert this specific facility serves surveillance. And it is a precedent machine: if the reused-permit route holds up at the Interior Board of Land Appeals, it becomes the template for data centers across the Western public estate, which is why Boulder City joined the appeal and Rep. Tlaib moved to ban the practice. The documented facts make this a Return-on-Investment case; the appeal will decide whether the shortcut was also illegal.
Help us fill these lines.
- OpenWill the Interior Board of Land Appeals rule the Determination of NEPA Adequacy an unlawful sidestep, or uphold the reused-permit route as a template for public-land data centers? (held at SOME SMOKE)
- OpenWhat is Skylar Capital's actual role and stake in the Townsite Solar 2 applicant, and did Bill Perkins personally direct the BLM application? (attributed to the fund, PROBABLY TRUE)