Two members of President Barack Obama’s Cabinet toured a solar energy project in Cary today to tout the expansion of the renewable energy industry.

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Energy Secretary Steven Chu visited the project at SAS Institute headquarters in Cary. There, Southern Energy Management of Morrisville has planted one of the Southeast’s largest solar farms.

Southern Energy Management was the primary contractor for SunPower on two 1-megawatt solar arrays at SAS, according to the Department of the Interior. The project includes a 24-collector solar water heating system and a 1-megawatt photovoltaic (PV) system of 5,040 solar panels on five acres of land.

Salazar called the firm one of hundreds of cutting-edge renewable energy companies sprouting up around the country, his department said.

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Half a million people want a say in how or whether the Obama administration develops energy from the Outer Continental Shelf along the nation’s coastlines.

The Department of Interior’s Minerals Management Service announced today that 530,000 people have responded in the public comment period about the issue, reports Barb Barrett.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced in February that he was extending the Bush administration’s timeline for developing a plan on drilling for oil and natural gas off the nation’s coastlines.

Salazar also announced that the administration would expand its review of offshore energy to include the potential for wind, wave and currents.

According to studies, the coastline off North Carolina’s Outer Banks contain some of the best wind potential in the nation. Previous studies have indicated reserves of natural gas and, possibly, oil in the same region.

The Department of Interior’s public comment period ended Monday. After the administration reviews the comments, its next step is to begin an environmental analysis for a five-year plan, as required by law, for oil and gas development in the Outer Continental Shelf.

The federal government has cleared the way for wind farms off North Carolina's coast.

Regulations published Wednesday afternoon in the Federal Register and touted by President Obama at an Earth Day speech lay out the rules for leasin, siting, permitting and building wind turbines and other forms of renewable energy.

Dozens of applications for proposed offshore wind projects are expected in the north and central Atlantic in the coming months, said Interior Secretary Ken Salazar.

A report from his department says the Outer Banks have some of the strongest and steadiest winds on the East Coast.

"We realize there's a tremendous opportunity offshore," said Bob Leker, a program manager with the State Energy Office in Raleigh. "I think it's a good idea. It's a resource the country as a whole has a lot of." (N&O)

The Obama administration will speed up the Department of Interior's work on using the ocean's winds, waves and tidal currents to produce energy.

But it isn't reinstating the ban on offshore drilling that former President Bush lifted last year.

Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar announced this afternoon that the agency will finish developing federal rules on offshore renewable energy within the next month or so. The new rules would outline what the administration expects of states and companies in developing renewable energy in offshore federal waters.

Salazar also extended by 180 days the public comment period on a five-year offshore drilling plan dropped by Bush in the waning days of his presidency. That period was to end March 23; it was extended to Sept. 23. Salazar said the plan will include renewable energy programs as well as oil and natural gas drilling.

North Carolina's coastline has some of the nation's strongest offshore opportunities for wind energy, according to a map Salazar showed at a news conference this afternoon in Washington. But the state's coast also has captured the interest of the nation's oil and gas companies.

And a proposed lease sale of acreage off the Virginia coastline — just north of the Outer Banks — could go on as planned in 2011, Salazar said.

"That plan is already in place," he said. "It's already opened up. Will this effort have an impact on that? I don't know."