As Oregon and the rest of the country
work to transition to renewable energy,
conflicts often arise about where to put
things like wind turbines and solar panels.
But a researcher from Oregon State
University is on the leading edge of a new
way to head off some of those conflicts,
combining farmland and solar panels,
taking the meaning of solar
farm to a next level.
And as he tells it,
the idea might just be a game changer.
Environmental reporter Kayle
Williams brings us our story
on a small research farm
outside of Wilsonville.
Chad Higgins feels like he's
watching the future unfold.
I see a path to to a future where we're not
under exigent threat of self destruction.
Higgins, a biological and
environmental engineering professor
at Oregon State University,
overseas A5 acre experiment in agrivoltaics.
For those who haven't heard
the term, Higgins explains.
It's the collocation of both solar
energy harvesting and agricultural
production on the same piece
of land for mutual benefit.
And it's that mutual benefit that has
Higgins so optimistic about the future. More
plant productivity,
better quality crops, more nutritious,
less water use, More energy use.
That's what you get when
you put them together.
It's a true synergy when
you put them together.
Higgins has been experimenting with
agrivoltaics for nearly a decade.
And one of the things he's learned
is that many plants actually
get more sun than they need.
So the leaves to stay cool,
they pull water from the ground and
and and and sweat basically evaporate.
That cools them off.
But that means crops use more water,
and agriculture already accounts for
more than 70% of global water use.
You take away the amount of light
that the plants are not going to
use and can't physiologically use.
That reduces their stress.
They use less water, You get more.
Productivity because you have
less stress plant, so more crop,
higher quality crop crop, less water.
Now you could block that
extra light with a shade,
or you could do it with solar panels,
harvesting the extra sunlight for something.
Humans are in desperate need of
clean electricity. Once you do,
you've got yourself a happy plant.
So a happy plant is a is
a more producing plant.
It's a less water using plant.
It's a higher quality crop plant using
solar panels to regulate how
much sun each field gets.
Has shown promising results.
Higgins has grown tomatoes
with bigger yields and beans
with higher protein content.
He's raised sheep in
fields under solar panels,
and while the sheep didn't grow any faster,
he was able to graze more of them per
acre because the grass grew more quickly.
He's also found that because plants
cool the environment around them,
the solar panels work more efficiently.
But all of that was on small scale projects.
The project he's working on now
at the North Willamette Research
and Extension Center,
is the first time he's put his
theories to the test at a scale
resembling an actual working farm,
where we showed that the plane could fly.
But we have to figure out how to
develop a commercial jetliner. Now.
Higgins sees the development of
agrivoltaics is the kind of thing that
could provide a necessary paradigm shift
in both farming and energy production.
Experts put the maximum capacity
of the globe at somewhere between
10 and 12 billion people.
And projections have us reaching that
threshold before the end of the century.
The limiting factor?
Having enough food and water
to feed everyone.
If you assume current course and we
don't really come up with any new
technologies or paradigm shifts, then
the projections look kind of gloomy.
And by gloomy, Higgins is referring
to widespread food shortages and
conflicts over a scarce water supply.
But because agrivoltaics increase
production, cut water use,
and provide renewable power,
Higgins isn't fearful for the future.
If you include dual use agrivoltaics
as a methodology in your projections,
you actually come up with a
future that's sustainable.
Now, of course, the practice isn't
all upside It won't work everywhere
or with every kind of crop.
It might be hard to get insurers to
cover expensive solar panels in fields
where farm equipment is working.
And the upfront costs are sizable,
though Higgins said his research shows
that these kinds of projects pay for
themselves within a decade or less.
After that, they add to the
bottom line for farmers.
I don't have to convince people
to have a different ethical or
political viewpoint or or anything.
It's a it's a it's a profitable
enterprise to do it. So.
So I'm more about changing pockets
than I am about changing minds.
And that's the biggest reason why Higgins
sees aggrevoltaics expanding rapidly
in the coming years. It's a moneymaker
from science to full scale.
Implementation is going to be
5 years. That's pretty fast.
And and the reason for that is because
it's just it's profit positive.
Well, I've been able
to corral Kale here in The Newsroom to
ask a little bit more about this story.
Let's talk about those panels.
Do they move? Indeed they do.
They are on Pistons and so they start
facing east when the sun comes up.
Follow them all day as the sunsets
on the other side and you know,
they actually can go fully vertical
and that allows farm equipment and
tractors to go up and down the roads.
Okay interesting.
And he said 10 years to get their money
back out of it, that seems like a lot.
Yeah. I mean, I think that the economics
of this are still to be determined.
This is still an experiment and once
this gets out into the open market,
that will really figure out how
economically viable these are.
But I mean it increases the productivity
of the crops you're already growing.
You're producing power that
you can sell back to the grid.
I mean, it's a dual benefit type of system.
Yeah, it is interesting.
It's fascinating actually.
All right.
And if there was wide scale adoption of this,
what do you think?
So he told me that if 1% of
American farmland were convolted
to these agrivoltaic systems,
that that would meet all of
our clean energy goals.
And I think in his paper,
it said something like it would be
the equivalent of removing about
71,000 cars from the road annually.
Wow. OK. Impressive and promising.
We'll have to stay tuned and
see how that goes. Thanks, Kale.
It's great stuff.
Sure thing.