Donald Trump Takes Credit For Solar Panel Border Wall, Calls It 'My Idea'

Speaking at a Cedar Rapids, Iowa rally Wednesday, President Donald Trump claimed credit for the idea of a solar panel border wall with Mexico, according to the Associated Press.

During the rally, he spoke about his mission to advance technology in rural areas of the United States, saying that he would encourage drones and sensors on harvesting equipment. However, the highlight of the rally was when he suggested putting solar panels on the proposed border wall that would separate Mexico and the United States. President Trump has previously spoken about building a border wall, suggesting hypothetical benefits such as a decrease in illegal immigration and drug trafficking.

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“We’re thinking of something that’s unique — we’re talking about the southern border, lots of sun, lots of heat. We’re thinking about building the wall as a solar wall, so it creates energy and pays for itself,” he said. “Pretty good imagination, right? Good? My idea.”

Except it wasn’t quite his idea.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued an invitation in March 2017 for companies to submit designs for the border wall. More than 200 companies responded to the invitation. One of those companies was Gleason Partners in Las Vegas. Tom Gleason, 70, the founder and owner of Gleason Partners, said his plans for the wall include building solar panels into the wall and installing them on top of the wall as rotating arrays, according to the Las Vegas Review Journal. Other materials he mentioned possible wall climbers would encounter were steel mesh and barbed wire.

Trump said the “intent is to offer a realistic, no-nonsense design for the wall that pays for itself,” as well as one that “will make everybody happy including our president,” he said in an email to the Las Vegas Review Journal.

In early June, President Trump allegedly suggested a “solar wall” in a meeting with Republican congressional leaders. He told them they could talk about the idea if “they said it was his idea.”

According to Gleason Partners, the electricity generated by the wall could be sold. They also said that the sales of that electricity would cover the cost of building the wall “in 20 years or less.”

Solar panel research has advanced in the past few years.

The two widely recognized classes of technologies for converting solar energy into electricity are photovoltaics (PV) and concentrated solar power (CSP), according to a study titled “The Future of Solar Energy” that was conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Energy Initiative. The study claims solar-power generation will be dominated by these technologies between now and 2050.

Read: Cheaper Solar, Wind Energy Make Trump's Promise To Bring Back Coal Jobs DOA, Forecast Predicts

The study aimed to clarify certain points of contention for countries, especially the United States, when considering replacing “conventional sources of electricity” with solar-power energy. It said that solar-powered energy could be more economically beneficial for developing countries in order to decrease their dependence on imported oil.

Since the United States has previously relied on imported oil for most of their day-to-day necessities, if President Trump plans to move forward with his proposed border wall, solar panels could become a serious consideration in the near future.