DOWN AN INTERNET RABBIT HOLE…FINDING SHEEP… AND SOLAR PANELS!


This all started with an article I read on the Internet…


This all started with an article I read on the Internet, about commercial solar panels…and sheep! This led me down a rabbit hole, into a warren of possible routes and ideas, of exploitation and dissent, of great possibilities…and potentially great changes. The original article was about Solar Grazing1


. This set out how grazing of sheep under fields of


solar panels, was providing a lifeline to the shepherding sector, as high fuel costs and a squeeze on suitable labour, caused some Clean Energy companies in the US to turn towards more original methods to keep their solar panels from being overwhelmed…by grass! You may ask ‘… grass…what’s the deal with grass?’ Well, it is because it is a significant fire hazard and it needs to be periodically cut. This had previously been done with people and lawnmowers, both of which are expensive. Sheep on the other hand, were ideal grazers and provide additional benefits, such as being better to manoeuvre around uneven sites and around the supports for the solar panels, plus…having an arguably better carbon footprint than a man with a mower, though this is a rabbit hole I do not wish to descend right now. But why sheep, why not cattle…or goats? The answer is simple, cattle like to rub up against the solar panel supports, scratching themselves when they itch, bending and breaking the supports plus many times, they are too tall for the solar panels and can’t get underneath them. As for goats, they are good grazers…but they have a natural tendency to climb onto the top of the solar panels, causing micro fractures in the panels and also to chew the wires. So it is sheep…and not only in the USA where the original article was based…but this is also in operation parts of Canada, France, Japan, Australia, South America and the UK.


The solar industry in the USA is rapidly growing with an estimated additional 32 Gigawatts of power capacity to be added this year, enough for about 25 million homes. However, this is not without cost…as the American Farmland Trust, a non-profit organisation, estimates the USA will lose approximately 18.4 million acres of agricultural land, in the years between 2016 – 2040, to these new ‘Agrivoltaics’. In some parts of the world, for example Canada, there has been a historical resistance in the past from environmental regulators, farmers associations and farmers themselves to having land being used for both solar power and agriculture2


as it was seen as taking farmland out of food production.


However, research in the USA is developing around vertical and movable solar panels as well as transparent panels, which all allow the opportunity for farmers to move from pastoral farming to arable farming by growing corn, wheat or soybeans on solar farms3


. 1. Bloomberg, 24 June 2023


2. Canada’s National Observer, 29 December 2022 3. The LENS, 9 September 2022


12 | ADMISI - The Ghost In The Machine | Q4 Edition 2023


It also allows solar panel supports to be high enough for farm vehicles to safely manoeuvre around the panels and the crops. As Professor Mitch Tuinstra at Purdue University put it ‘Either way


One is storing them as electrons and the other in the plants’.


There have seemingly been some unexpected benefits to this mutual relationship of solar energy generation and agriculture. Solar panels provide shade and help aid the retaining of moisture in the soil. They can keep livestock cooler and increase the yield in certain crops, depending on the region, such as lettuce, kale and tomatoes plus lower the water usage for irrigation4


. As for


pastoral usage, studies in Australia over four years which concluded in 2022, found that the quality and especially the quantity of wool produced by Merino sheep that had been farmed on solar farms, had significantly increased5


. Local


farmers put this down to the conditions in which the sheep were living, relatively clean and without burrs and dust…leading to very little contamination of the wool as well as the solar panels providing shade for the sheep and thus protecting the wool from sunlight.


4. Canary Media, 20 June 2023 5. ABC Rural, 30 May 2022


, they are storing solar energy .


EITHER WAY, THEY ARE STORING SOLAR ENERGY. ONE IS STORING THEM AS ELECTRONS AND THE OTHER IN THE PLANTS.’


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