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Cash-strapped farms are growing a new crop: solar panels
Construction is slated to begin this spring on a 1.2-megawatt solar array on the Kominek farm (in Colorado). Some 3,300 solar panels will rest on 6-foot and 8-foot-high stilts, providing shade for crops like tomatoes, peppers, kale, and beans on a five-acre plot. Pasture grasses and beehive boxes are planned for the perimeter…
The vegetables will be sold through a community farm-share program, which allows neighbors to invest in the project in exchange for boxes of produce.
Byron Kominek said he hopes similar projects will soon follow. In 2018, Boulder County officials updated the local land-use codes to allow for community solar on land otherwise designated for agriculture, and Kominek plans to help train other farmers how to grow crops alongside solar panels. “The hope is that young farmers will have a better understanding of how to do this, and will go out to already built solar arrays, or planned solar arrays, and find a new profession,” he said.
Office upgrades: Going solar
Historic 1 Main Street, built in 1835, has received its most recent modernization this fall with the addition of solar panels to provide clean electricity.
Building owners Meg and Billy Lloyd partnered with Genesee Valley Conservancy to install the photovoltaic system that will offset 100% of the land trust’s electric use. They acknowledge that “while the land trust works to protect habitat, open space, and farmland in the Genesee Valley, a large supply of power is needed to run the operations of this work: computers, printers, lights, modems, etc.”
The up-front costs were shared by the building owners and the Conservancy, as both will benefit from the project. The Conservancy will see an immediate reduction in monthly utility bills and after six years will break even on the initial investment and begin seeing a net-savings.
Tucson Electric Power Series
Tucson Electric Power (TEP) provides safe, reliable and increasingly sustainable electric service to approximately 425,000 customers in Southern Arizona. The company is on track to surpass its own ambitious renewable energy goals by expanding use of wind and solar power. TEP is a local leader in community service, volunteerism and economic development efforts, with energy efficiency programs that help customers to better manage their energy costs. It is with great pride that we spotlight TEP programs and services.
Mrs. Green is happy…
A flock of sheep chews away the weeds that grow underneath one of Tucson Electric Power’s (TEP) solar arrays instead of lawnmowers, spray, or weed trimmers, demonstrating one way TEP supports eco-friendly practices.
“To make sure our large solar array gets plenty of sun, we can’t let the weeds grow too high. That’s where the sheep come in,” said Ericca Suarez, a Technical Specialist in Renewable Energy. “It really is more sustainable to use the sheep.” Rancher Rusty Cocke manages the herd to keep the panels productive while preventing damage to the 1,200-acre site.
Learn more about the programs, sustainable practices and powerful partnerships fostered by Tucson Electric Power in the Tucson Electric Power Podcast Series.
Struggling Farmers See Bright Spot in Solar
“U.S. farmers are embracing an alternative means of turning sunlight into revenue during a sharp downturn in crop prices: solar power.
Solar panels are being installed across the Farm Belt for personal and external use on land where growers are struggling to make ends meet. The tit-for-tat tariffs applied by the U.S. and China to each other’s goods have cut demand for American crops. Futures prices for corn, soybeans and wheat are all trading around their lowest levels since 2010. Making matters worse, record spring rainfall…”
U.S. Solar Market Insight
“The U.S. installed 13.3 gigawatts (GW) of solar PV capacity in 2019 to reach 77.7 GW of total installed capacity, enough to power 14.5 million American homes. Solar accounted for 40% of all new electric generating capacity added to the grid in 2019 – more than any other energy source and the highest share in the industry’s history…”
What businesses [including land trusts] should know about the evolution of rural solar
Solar projects certainly are growing rapidly throughout the United States, with total installed capacity just shy of 70 gigawatts and a contracted pipeline of 27.9 GW, according to SEIA. A recent Wall Street Journal analysis of EIA data reported that solar projects occupied 258,000 acres in 2018, while NREL estimates that solar will occupy 3 million acres by 2030.
That may be a small fraction of the nearly 900 million acres of farmland in the United States (PDF), but it’s enough to make agricultural communities apprehensive about the advance of solar onto previously pastoral land. While landowning farmers are grateful for the steady income that comes from leasing to solar projects, others in rural areas—including many state agricultural departments—are still grappling with what the growth of solar will mean for their concept of rural land and role as agricultural boosters…
And with wind and solar cropping up in more rural communities, the bar is being set higher. “The future for renewable energy has to include a sustainable land use component,” Hoosier Energy’s Cisney said. In leveraging new partnerships and co-location opportunities among developers, farmers and local communities, rural America has the potential to assume a more active leadership role in cooperatively advancing the clean energy transition…
Solar light of the world: Evangelicals launch global clean energy campaign
Solar panels could be coming soon to a church near you. Through a campaign called Project 20.’25, the World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) has set out to get 20 percent of its members to convert fully to clean energy by 2025.
This fall, the global network announced its partnership with Smart Roofs Solar Inc. Together they will help universities, health care facilities, and churches looking to adopt clean power, including offering guidance for local suppliers and providing financing options.
Agrivoltaics: Solar panels on farms could be a win-win
The solar panels in the fields at the University of Massachusetts Crop Research and Education Center don’t look like what most of us have come to expect. Instead of hunkering close to the earth, they’re mounted seven feet off the ground, with ample room for farmers or cows to wander underneath.
Panels are separated by two and three-foot gaps, instead of clustering tightly together. Light streams through these spaces and, underneath, rows of leafy kale and Brussels sprouts replace the typical bare earth or grass…
Lifestyle changes aren’t enough to save the planet. Here’s what could.
There is a long history of industry-funded “deflection campaigns” aimed to divert attention from big polluters and place the burden on individuals. Individual action is important and something we should all champion.
But appearing to force Americans to give up meat, or travel, or other things central to the lifestyle they’ve chosen to live is politically dangerous: it plays right into the hands of climate change deniers whose strategy tends to be to portray climate champions as freedom-hating totalitarians.