Comment by anonfordays

6 months ago

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.

  • >A) that’s simply untrue.

    Wrong, it's simply true. Solar panels use land poorly, the MW per unit area is poor.

    >You can grow crops and graze under the panels

    Agrovoltaics accounts for less than 0.5% of commercial solar installations in rural lands. Effectively no one is doing this, it's not cost effective. You can't fit tractors/combines between the panels.

    >And tend not to be put up on your own land without your consent.

    What do you mean? No one is putting pump jacks on property without the owners consent.

Than a wind turbine? Not sure that's true

  • Wind turbines have a bigger base than pumpjacks, but both are frequently scattered across west texas farm and cattle fields. Solar wouldn't be as economical as far as space goes. But you go a little further west and that's arid desert which prob should be fine for solar.