Throwing Shade Is Solar Energy's New Superpower
The farming world is learning how to blend agriculture with renewable energy installations — and gaining on both ends.
Starting small in Japan.
Photographer: Toru Hanai/Bloomberg
In rural America, the shoulder-high corn is increasingly competing with a new cash crop: solar power. Acres of solar panels shine brightly in fields along interstates and rural byways, signaling a change in how America's farming country generates income. The need for a happy marriage between these old and new industries has inspired a burst of innovation and a new word to describe the combination: Agrivoltaics.
The Inflation Reduction Act includes billions of dollars in renewable energy funds that will accelerate the adoption of solar and other renewables. Some of the new solar panels will land on rooftops, but most will be concentrated in large utility-scale arrays that the US Department of Energy claims could eventually cover an area roughly equivalent in size to Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.