You don’t need unused land you just need to displace agriculture. If you have any land used for cattle grazing for example you can have enough grass to feed 1 cow or you can have enough solar to power 20-40 homes. Pretty obvious to me which is the more productive land usage there.
Or keep the cow and put solar on rooftops, car parks, etc. The cow shits out natural fertilizer which helps the land recover quicker so it can be used to produce more productive (in terms of people fed) crops again while the cow goes and grazes somewhere else where the soil’s no longer very productive.
It’s not a lot of land, sure, but there’s literally zero downside to putting solar in places where shade is desirable anyway. Just mandating solar in car parks alone could provide a ridiculous amount of electricity in more car-dependent cities.
You don’t need unused land you just need to displace agriculture. If you have any land used for cattle grazing for example you can have enough grass to feed 1 cow or you can have enough solar to power 20-40 homes. Pretty obvious to me which is the more productive land usage there.
Or keep the cow and put solar on rooftops, car parks, etc. The cow shits out natural fertilizer which helps the land recover quicker so it can be used to produce more productive (in terms of people fed) crops again while the cow goes and grazes somewhere else where the soil’s no longer very productive.
It’s not a lot of land, sure, but there’s literally zero downside to putting solar in places where shade is desirable anyway. Just mandating solar in car parks alone could provide a ridiculous amount of electricity in more car-dependent cities.