Geothermal lease sale on federal land in Nevada nets $4.8M

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The U.S. Bureau of Land Management sold geothermal leases on 60 parcels of federal land in Nevada on Tuesday, netting nearly $4.83 million for 186,641 acres. The sale included two parcels that overlap the site for NextEra Energy’s proposed 1-GW Sawtooth Energy Center solar project.

The sale netted less than previous geothermal lease auctions, including the 2025 Nevada lease sale, which brought in total receipts around $9.4 million, and June’s geothermal lease auction in New Mexico, which brought in $16.5 million — the second-highest-grossing sale in BLM history.

In 2025, BLM sold roughly 280,000 lease acres in Nevada, while the 2026 auction sold nearly 187,000 acres.

Parcels were located in Lyon, Churchill, Mineral, Humboldt, Esmerelda, Lander, Nye, Eureka, Lincoln and White Pine counties in Nevada, BLM said. Ormat Technologies was the biggest bidder in Tuesday’s auction, spending around $2.3 million to win eight parcels covering about 20,263 acres. 

BLM originally marked 83 parcels for sale in this auction. Zero parcels were removed from the bidding process due to protests; 10 were removed “for other reasons,” according to BLM. The remaining 13 parcels drew no bids. 

The two parcels that overlap NextEra’s Sawtooth project were sold to United Minerals and Mining for about $15,400 each. NextEra has a pending right-of-way grant application for Sawtooth’s proposed location in Nye County, Nevada.

NextEra had filed a comment on the proposed sale, asking that BLM “remove, defer, or reconfigure” three overlapping parcels during final parcel review “to avoid creating a potentially incompatible leasehold interest before BLM completes its review” of the Sawtooth application.

BLM rejected that request in its response to the comment, saying it “manages the land for multiple use,” but one of the three overlapping parcels didn’t end up listed in Tuesday’s auction. 

BLM told NextEra in its response to its comments that “subsequent authorizations for other uses, including right of ways, must not unreasonably interfere with geothermal operations undertaken by the lease holder.”

“Because the parcel in question would be leased prior to authorization of NextEra’s [right of way], NextEra must collaborate with any potential lessee and adjust its operations accordingly to avoid land use conflicts,” BLM said.

NextEra did not respond to a request for comment.