US President Donald Trump wants to add solar panels to his long-promised southern border wall — a plan he says would help pay for the wall’s construction and add to its aesthetic appeal.
“We’re thinking about building the wall as a solar wall so it creates energy and pays for itself,” Trump said at a rally on Wednesday night in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “And this way, Mexico will have to pay much less money, and that’s good, right?”
Trump had previously floated the solar panel idea during a closed-door meeting with Republican members of US Congress earlier this month, but this was the first time he had discussed the idea publicly.
“Pretty good imagination, right?” Trump said at the rally, framing the plan as “my idea.”
Not quite.
The notion of adding solar panels to the border wall was explored in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in March.
Vasilis Fthenakis, director of the Center for Life Cycle Analysis at Columbia University, and Ken Zweibel, former director of the Solar Institute at George Washington University, concluded it was “not only technically and economically feasible, it might even be more practical than a traditional wall.”
They said a 3,200km solar wall could cost less than US$1 billion, instead of tens of billions for a traditional border wall, and possibly become “wildly profitable.”
The writers were studying a concept laid out by Homero Aridjis and James Ramey in the online World Post in December last year.
The idea was also proposed by one of the companies that submitted a design to the government as a border wall prototype.
The bid by Las Vegas-based Gleason Partners LLC proposed covering some sections of the wall with solar panels to provide electricity for lighting, sensors and patrol stations along the wall.
Gleason said sales of electricity to utilities could cover the cost of construction in 20 years or less and suggested that power could also be sold to Mexico.
Managing partner Thomas Gleason said he was not sure whether his company was still in the running for the contract.
“We accomplished what we wanted to accomplish, and that’s to make the president realize there was such a possibility,” he said.
US Department of Homeland Security spokesman David Lapan said nobody from the department had shared the submitted proposals with the White House, though several have been made public by the bidding companies, but Trump’s comments could raise questions about whether he was attempting to interfere with what is intended to be a regimented contracting process.
The government has selected the finalists for contracts to build wall prototypes in San Diego and is expected to announce the winners soon.
During his campaign, the president vowed to build an impenetrable wall along the length of the US-Mexico border out of concrete and steel, but since his inauguration he has faced resistance, with US Congress unwilling to finance the plan.
Trump has long maintained that Mexico would pay for the wall, even though Mexico has flatly refused.
Trump insists that even if US taxpayers have to cover the costs upfront, Mexico would eventually be forced to reimburse the US in some way.
On Thursday, Trump tweeted: “Mexico was just ranked the second deadliest country in the world, after only Syria. Drug trade is largely the cause. We will BUILD THE WALL!”
Trump was apparently referring to a report released last month by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think tank.
However, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, whose latest figures are from 2015, indicates there are at least nine nations with higher homicide rates than Mexico, and that does not include rates for conflict-torn nations such as Afghanistan and Syria.
REBUILDING: A researcher said that it might seem counterintuitive to start talking about reconstruction amid the war with Russia, but it is ‘actually an urgent priority’ Italy is hosting the fourth annual conference on rebuilding Ukraine even as Russia escalates its war, inviting political and business leaders to Rome to promote public-private partnerships on defense, mining, energy and other projects as uncertainty grows about the US’ commitment to Kyiv’s defense. Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy were opening the meeting yesterday, which gets under way as Russia accelerated its aerial and ground attacks against Ukraine with another night of pounding missile and drone attacks on Kyiv. Italian organizers said that 100 official delegations were attending, as were 40 international organizations and development banks. There are
TARIFF ACTION: The US embassy said that the ‘political persecution’ against former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro disrespects the democratic traditions of the nation The US and Brazil on Wednesday escalated their row over US President Donald Trump’s support for former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, with Washington slapping a 50 percent tariff on one of its main steel suppliers. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva threatened to reciprocate. Trump has criticized the prosecution of Bolsonaro, who is on trial for allegedly plotting to cling on to power after losing 2022 elections to Lula. Brasilia on Wednesday summoned Washington’s top envoy to the country to explain an embassy statement describing Bolsonaro as a victim of “political persecution” — echoing Trump’s description of the treatment of Bolsonaro as
The tale of a middle-aged Chinese man, or “uncle,” who disguised himself as a woman to secretly film and share videos of his hookups with more than 1,000 men shook China’s social media, spurring fears for public health, privacy and marital fidelity. The hashtag “red uncle” was the top trending item on China’s popular microblog Sina Weibo yesterday, drawing at least 200 million views as users expressed incredulity and shock. The online posts told of how the man in the eastern city of Nanjing had lured 1,691 heterosexual men into sexual encounters at his home that he then recorded and distributed online. The
Hundreds of protesters marched through the Mexican capital on Friday denouncing gentrification caused by foreigners, with some vandalizing businesses and shouting “gringos out!” The demonstration in the capital’s central area turned violent when hooded individuals smashed windows, damaged restaurant furniture and looted a clothing store. Mexico City Government Secretary Cesar Cravioto said 15 businesses and public facilities were damaged in what he called “xenophobic expressions” similar to what Mexican migrants have suffered in other countries. “We are a city of open arms... there are always ways to negotiate, to sit at the table,” Cravioto told Milenio television. Neighborhoods like Roma-Condesa
RSS