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 / Updated By Andrew Rafferty 
 
 Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly acknowledged Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s proposed wall on the southern border of the United States will not extend “from sea to shining sea” and could partially be fencing. 
 
 Kelly had few details about the size and scope of the wall when he testified in front of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, saying the administration would rely on the input of those working on the border for the specifics. 
 
 "There is no way I can give the committee an estimate of how much it will cost," Kelly said. "I don’t know what it will be made of, I don’t know how high it will be, I don’t know if it’s going to have solar panels on its side and what the one side is going to look like and how’s it’s going to be painted." 
 
 "It’s unlikely that we will build a wall or physical barrier from sea to shining sea. But it is very likely, I’m committed, to putting it where the men and women say we should put it," he added. 
 
 A wall on the 2,000-mile border between the U.S.and Mexico was a signature campaign promise for Trump as part of his pledge to cut down on illegal immigration. He also declared that Mexico would pay for the barrier, despite consistent insistence by Mexican officials that they will never fund it. 
 
 The White House made a request for $1 billion to begin construction of the wall as part of its push to boost spending on defense and border security. But Democrats have vowed to block funding for the barrier and Republicans are wary of lumping the border request in with a broader spending bill to prevent a government shutdown before the April 28 deadline. 
 
 "The sooner we stop this, you know, we’re going to build a wall from sea to shining sea and the Mexicans are going to pay for it; it’s embarrassing," Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill said Wednesday. "It’s not going to happen. Everybody in Congress knows it’s not going to happen." 
 
 The first round of bids for contractors hoping to construct the wall were due Tuesday. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell estimated the full wall would cost between $12 to $15 billion, but a CNBC analysis found that number could rise up to $25 billion plus millions in annual maintenance. 
 
 In written testimony submitted to the committee, Kelly credited the president for a declining number of arrests of people caught trying to illegally cross the border. The head of Homeland Security said March was the fifth straight month border arrests declined and marked the lowest monthly number of arrests in the last 17 years. 
 
 "We’ve seen an absolutely amazing drop in the number of migrants coming out of Central America taking that terribly dangerous route from Central America into the United States," Kelly said. “It won’t last unless we do something, again, to secure the border. The wall, or physical barrier, something to secure our border.” 
 
 White House press secretary Sean Spicer said in a statement that the drop in arrests "demonstrates that the President's commitment to securing our border and supporting law enforcement is already showing results." ||||| This undated rendering provided by DarkPulse Technologies Inc. shows a proposed border wall between Mexico and the U.S. The wall proposed by Arizona-based DarkPulse Technologies would be constructed with... (Associated Press) 
 
 SAN DIEGO (AP) — Tuesday was the deadline for companies to propose designs for President Donald Trump's border wall with Mexico. U.S. Customs and Border Protection will ask several of the bidders to build prototypes in San Diego. 
 
 The government won't identify companies until contracts are awarded around June 1 — and even then, only the winners — but some bidders released plans on their own. 
 
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 SOLAR PANELS 
 
 Gleason Partners LLC of Las Vegas proposes solar panels to cover sections of the wall. 
 
 The panels would provide electricity for lighting, sensors and patrol stations along the wall. Sales of electricity to utilities could cover the cost of construction in 20 years or less, according to the company. Power could also be sold to Mexico. 
 
 "I like the wall to be able to pay for itself," said managing partner Thomas Gleason. 
 
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 TOURIST ATTRACTION 
 
 Crisis Resolution Security Services Inc. of Clarence, Illinois, proposes a wall that is 56 feet (17 meters) high and 22 feet (7 meters) wide at the top — with plenty of room to allow tourists to enjoy desert views. 
 
 The height — nearly twice what the government envisions — would deter climbers, and its width would give the structure longevity, said chief executive officer Michael Hari. 
 
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 NUCLEAR WASTE 
 
 Clayton Industries Inc. of Pittsburgh proposes storing nuclear waste along the wall in trenches that are at least 100 feet (30 meters) deep. 
 
 Money already collected by the U.S. Department of Energy from people who benefit from nuclear power would help pay for the wall. 
 
 The bid includes an option for hardware to convert the nuclear waste to energy. 
 
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 ARTWORK ON BOTH SIDES OF THE BORDER 
 
 Concrete Contractors Interstate of San Diego proposed a polished concrete wall augmented with stones and artifacts specific to areas on the 2,000-mile (3,218-kilometer) border. 
 
 Russ Baumgartner, CEO of the company, says the wall should be "a piece of art." 
 
 Customs and Border Protection's solicitation says the wall should be "aesthetically pleasing" from the U.S. side. Baumgartner wants to decorate both sides. 
 
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 BALLISTIC CONCRETE 
 
 DarkPulse Technologies of Scottsdale, Arizona, proposes a concrete wall that can withstand tampering or attacks of any kind. 
 
 "You could fire a tank round at it and it will take the impact," said company founder Dennis O'Leary. 
 
 Fiber sensors would be embedded in the concrete to immediately alert officials to any attempts to climb over or tunnel under the wall. It would be coated with a slick coating that would prevent climbing. 
 
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 NO BORDER 
 
 Otra Nation, a group of U.S. and Mexican citizens, proposed the world's first shared co-nation along the border "open to citizens of both countries and co-maintained by Mexico and the United States of America." 
 
 It would also create "nodes of cultural production" such as libraries, museums, galleries and workshops between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, and other spots with cities on both sides of the border. 
 
 It would prohibit oil drilling and mining and create a "hyperloop transportation system" for people and cargo. ||||| PHOTOS: The Many Possible Shapes Of Trump's Border Wall 
 
 By the time bidding closed Tuesday, there was no lack of companies competing to build the wall President Trump has proposed for the border between the U.S. and Mexico. In fact, by The Associated Press' count, upwards of 200 organizations had expressed interest in designing and building it for Customs and Border Protection. 
 
 Despite their common goal, the companies submitting bids have followed some radically different paths in their approach. 
 
 Among the submissions are walls with solar panels, wire mesh and sloped, slippery surfaces. There are even walls that are no walls at all — statements standing instead as protests of a policy that from the start has drawn a lot of resistance. 
 
 As NPR's Richard Gonzales reports, the CBP plans to announce the finalists for the contract in June, at which point the companies still in the running would be expected to build a prototype roughly 30 feet long and anywhere from 18 to 30 feet tall. The AP notes the prototypes are expected to cost about $200,000 to $500,000 each; estimates for the cost of the wall covering the 2,000-mile border, however, range up to $38 billion. 
 
 Here's a glimpse of just a few of the designs vying to stand between the U.S. and Mexico, complete with renderings and explanations of how they could take shape. 
 
 The WireWall 
 
 The proposal from Riverdale Mills Corporation employs wire mesh, which is already used along the Mexican border with California and Arizona. Riverdale says the material can be manufactured up to 20 feet tall and installed up to 6 feet below ground, to prevent tunneling. 
 
 "The configurations of the wire mesh make it virtually impossible to climb or cut," Jane Meehan Lanzillo, director of corporate communications for Riverdale, tells NPR in an email. 
 
 Solar Panels 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Gleason Partners via AP Gleason Partners via AP 
 
 "I like the wall to be able to pay for itself," Thomas Gleason, managing partner of Gleason Partners LLC, tells the AP. 
 
 The company's proposal sets solar panels on sections of the wall, generating what it says would be approximately 2.0 megawatts of electricity per hour, according to the wire service. 
 
 Maximum-Security Wire Mesh 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Courtesy of the Penna Group Courtesy of the Penna Group 
 
 Composed of high-density steel packed into double wire mesh, the Penna Group's proposed wall takes its cue from maximum security prisons. "Nearly impossible to climb," it would also be built to withstand pick axes, acetylene torches and other handheld weapons, with the first 12 feet of its 30-foot height packed more densely. 
 
 Michael Evangelista-Ysasaga, CEO of the Penna Group, speaks to the aesthetics of the U.S.-facing side of the wall, telling NPR "the wire mesh panels will be emblazoned with the Seal of the United States." 
 
 The Security Curtain Wall 
 
 With its face pitched at an angle, the proposed wall put forth by San Diego Project Management, PSC, borrows medieval concepts to give to give guards a better view of possible "villains" approaching the wall — and with its walkway toward the top, it gives those guards a place to patrol from a height. 
 
 "The surface finish on the south side of the wall is of the same quality as the finish on a smooth floor slab," Patrick J. Balcazar, principal and managing partner at SDPM, writes in his proposal. "Smooth surface on the glacis [sloped] and [vertical] surfaces make climbing harder, and there are no handholds." 
 
 Hadrian's Wall 
 
 It's impossible to avoid: For a man bidding to build a massive wall, Rod Hadrian has a rather serendipitous name. Namesake of the Roman emperor who built the wall that once marked off the northernmost edge of the ancient empire — the wall that still stands in ruins in the U.K. today — Hadrian Construction Company has proposed a wall constructed in prefabricated panels. 
 
 Its Tridipanel design makes for something of a zig-zag shape, which he says would create a 30-foot wall that's at once lightweight and strong. 
 
 Adorned With Decoration 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption iCON Wall Solution by Single Eagle dba Concrete Contractors Interstate via AP iCON Wall Solution by Single Eagle dba Concrete Contractors Interstate via AP 
 
 The border wall should be "a piece of art," Russ Baumgartner, CEO of Concrete Contractors Interstate of San Diego, tells the AP. The wire service says the company's proposal calls for stones and artifacts set in polished concrete, reflecting the areas the wall wends through and rendering both sides "aesthetically pleasing" — unlike the CBP's callout, which asks only that the U.S. side be pleasant to look at. 
 
 Above, you can see a detail of the kind of decorative stones Baumgartner has in mind. 
 
 The Wall To End All Walls 
 
 Enlarge this image toggle caption Courtesy of Otra Nation Courtesy of Otra Nation 
 
 It is reasonable to conclude that this proposal is not exactly what Trump has in mind for his signature campaign promise. 
 
 "We propose a trans-national 'New Deal' to build an innovative shared co-nation based on local economic empowerment, energy independence and revolutionary infrastructure and transit," says the MADE Collective, a cross-disciplinary team that argues for the creation of what it calls the Otra Nation — a "regenerative co-nation shared by citizens of both Mexico and the United Stated and co-maintained by respective governments." 
 
 Far from a boundary between two states, the Otra Nation proposal envisions the construction of a hyperloop transit system and the rights to cross open borders of the three North American countries without impediment. 
 
 The Wall Of Sound 
 
 Imagine this. A post shared by JENNifer meriDIAN (@jmeridian.studio) on Mar 28, 2017 at 5:01pm PDT 
 
 One of at least three protest proposals ginned up by J.M. Design Studio of Pittsburgh, this one calls for "a semi-continuous wall of nearly 10 million pipe organs." The long line of 30-foot organs breaks in regular intervals, offering border-crossers the opportunity to walk straight through — but not before playing a ditty of their choosing. 
 
 Jennifer Meridian — an artist who says Trump's actual border wall is "preposterous for so many reasons," according to the Wall Street Journal — also proposes a wall of hammocks and a wall of refugees' gravestones for passersby to "consider the danger, terror, and horror they must have faced in trying to cross."
– President Trump's vision of a "big, beautiful wall" along the entire length of America's border with Mexico probably won't become reality, Homeland Security chief John Kelly admitted during a Senate hearing Wednesday. Kelly told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that he couldn't give them an estimate of how much the wall would cost, and it was unlikely that a physical barrier would be built "from sea to shining sea," NBC News reports. "I don't know what it will be made of, I don't know how high it will be, I don't know if it's going to have solar panels on its side and what the one side is going to look like and how's it's going to be painted," Kelly said. Kelly said he was committed, however, "to putting it where the men and women say we should put it." In response to a question from Sen. John McCain, Kelly said the "wall" Trump has been talking about could include electronic detection systems combined with patrols and fences in a system much like the existing one, the Los Angeles Times reports. Tuesday was the deadline for companies to propose border wall designs, the AP reports, and while the government won't identify bidders until contracts are awarded, those that publicly released proposals include Gleason Partners, which wants to include solar panels, and Clayton Industries, which proposes storing nuclear waste along the wall. (The White House has requested $1 billion for the first 62 miles of wall.)