Liz Truss, the new UK prime minister, isn’t a fan of solar farms. In 2014, when she was environment secretary, she described rows of panels arranged in a field to capture energy from the sun as a “blight on the landscape”. Eight years later, as a candidate for the 2022 Conservative Party leadership election, she said they were a threat to UK food supplies. Now her government seems intent on banning new solar farms by redefining some of the most promising sites for building them as prime farmland.
Tackling the climate emergency demands urgent decarbonisation of electricity systems. And amid the ongoing war in Ukraine and volatile gas prices, there is further need for homegrown renewable energy. To meet its target of a clean electricity grid by 2035, the government expects to boost the deployment of solar power fivefold. This would only increase the land allocated to solar farms to 0.3%, roughly 0.5% of that used for agriculture.
Overhauling energy supply is certain to create conflict. But there is an opportunity to design energy plants that have multiple benefits. For instance, solar farms last for 25 to 40 years. These sites, where human disturbance is minimal, could offer shelter to embattled wildlife and regenerate the soil.
