As debates continue over whether farmland should be reserved for agriculture or converted into solar farms, new research from Michigan State University suggests that it doesn’t have to be an either-or decision. Instead, a mix of both may offer farmers greater financial security.
The research focussed on California, which is the leading agricultural producer in the United States, generating billions in revenue and supplying a significant proportion of the country’s food. However, it is also the highest solar power generating state in the country, providing 28% of the state’s electricity generation.
While some farmers have stuck exclusively to growing crops and others have given over all their land to solar generation, Jake Stid, a graduate student in MSU’s College of Natural Science Hydrogeology Lab wanted to find out how beneficial collocating solar alongside agriculture might prove for the farmers.
There has been some research into the integration of solar onto agricultural land but this research looked at the implications for famers when some agricultural land was replaced by solar arrays, as this is what seems to happen more often in practice.
Stid said: ‘We’re taking a balanced approach to not just focus on the negatives or the positives, but to take them both together to look more deeply at what people are actually doing on the landscape. We’re asking what it means and how we can better plan for the future.’
Along with Anthony Kendall, an MSU assistant professor, Stid looked at aerial imagery from California alongside a host of data, to calculate the average farmer’s income and expenditure. They then modeled solar electricity generation from each site to estimate how much of a farmer’s costs could be offset by selling energy back to the grid.
They found that the hybrid approach reduced costs for water, fertiliser, and supplies. While selling energy from the solar arrays helped offset income loss from reduced crop output, even conserving water in some cases.
Stid said: ‘The conversation shouldn’t be as much about solar or agriculture, but solar and agriculture. They can work together, and it can be a collaboration rather than a conflict.
‘If I’m a farmer, these two acres of solar arrays are going to pay me a certain amount of money throughout the yea. I don’t have to worry about yield instability, or whether it’s going to be a wet or dry year.’
The full research can be read here.
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