Comment by zahlman
6 months ago
The US also apparently seeks energy independence, but seems unwilling to give up "farmland" (or, you know, household roofs or awnings over parking lots) to do it.
6 months ago
The US also apparently seeks energy independence, but seems unwilling to give up "farmland" (or, you know, household roofs or awnings over parking lots) to do it.
The US farms 60 million acres for corn and soybean biofuels currently. Lots of suboptimal ag land available for more efficient energy production (besides rooftops, irrigation canals, parking lots, etc; California has 4k miles of irrigation canals they can cover with solar PV, and is actively working towards this goal). As _aavaa_ mentions, agrivoltaics are very favorably for solar PV and ag production synergies.
(average age of farmers is ~58 years old, and with the decline in labor for ag, now is an optimal time to lease and lock up this land for renewables for the next 25-30 years [at which point generators can be repowered or the land returned to its previous condition])
There Is One Clear Winner In The Corn Vs. Solar Battle - https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/26/there-is-one-clear-winn... - April 28th, 2025
Ecologically informed solar enables a sustainable energy transition in US croplands - https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2501605122 | https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2501605122
New study compares growing corn for energy to solar production. It’s no contest. - https://www.anthropocenemagazine.org/2025/04/new-study-compa... - April 25th, 2025
Impacts of agrisolar co-location on the food–energy–water nexus and economic security - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-025-01546-4 | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-025-01546-4
HN Search: agrivoltaics (sorted by date) - https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
Happy to give up farmland if you can install a pump jack.
Pumpjacks take up the size of a shed. Fwiw, farmland in west Texas frequently has pumpjacks and windmills installed on them right alongside cow postures and corn fields.
Pump jacks use an order of magnitude less space.
A) that’s simply untrue. Solar panels and wind turbines don’t use up the land. You can grow crops and graze under the panels and the wind turbine is mostly in the sky.
B) solar panels and wind turbines tend not to spill toxic waste into the ground around them. And tend not to be put up on your own land without your consent.
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Than a wind turbine? Not sure that's true
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Household solar installations are still too expensive to be a reasonable option for many consumers in the United States. The amount of solar generation is also very dependent on where you live. Not to mention, it is becoming increasingly difficult to become a homeowner with people achieving this milestone later than ever. If you rent, it’s not really an option at all.
> On average, it takes between nine and 12 years for solar panels to pay for themselves.
https://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/spending/art...
This is all factually accurate. If you're a renter, see if your utility offers a community solar option. This enables you to get economic savings and exposure to solar without installing a system yourself. If you're a homeowner, in many cases, the return on investment (depending on installation cost) is under 10 years (after which your power is free for the life of the system, which will exceed 25 years). It should be compared to a bond return/investment (assuming cash purchase vs financing or a lease).
https://seia.org/initiatives/community-solar/
us is very close to net energy independence, if anything the nondesire to retool petrochemical plants for ultrasweet fracked fuel is the blocker for true energy independence.