For some time thermal solar has looked like an interesting power source. You do need big tracts in the desert and transmission lines, but the costs are much lower than photovoltaics. Light is converted to heat - something that can be readily stored in several schemes.
Yale environment360 has a nice summary that also includes solar thermal augmentation for conventional plants. Well worth a read if solar means photovoltaics to you.
If, as a country, we were really serious about alternate sources in the Southwest - this is probably the best investment if you want to get away from coal. Currently the Mountain West uses huge amounts of coal to generate electricity.
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