Here is an article about solar energy. It's one of those I send occasionally to help you in arguments if you need some.
--Kim
J&R Pierce Family Farm
Farm
Building on my post earlier this week, where I started digging into the “green energy scam,” I now want to talk about this common trope I hear floating around online: “solar is worse for the environment once you include manufacturing.”
Oldie but a goodie.
What’s so fascinating about this little earworm isn’t the criticism itself, but the standard being applied. When the topic is solar, people want to know where every last nut, every bolt, came from.
They want to account for the mining, the manufacturing, the shipping, the installation, the ownership structure, the land use.
Every impact, from cradle to grave.
And that's fair enough. I don't disagree that we need to scrutinize environmental impacts, and for a deeper read, I do discuss this in my book.
But the problem is, as I mentioned earlier this week, that we’re not applying the same level of scrutiny across the board.
When researchers do compare entire lifecycles, the numbers aren't particularly close, and the environmental losses and leaders begin to become quite clear.
According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's lifecycle assessment review (sourced in the comments), coal produces roughly 1,001 g CO₂e per kilowatt-hour of electricity generated over its lifecycle. Natural gas comes in around 486 g CO₂e.
Utility-scale solar photovoltaics come in around 46 g CO₂e, even after accounting for mining, manufacturing, transportation, installation, decommissioning, and recycling.
That's an important point because it highlights what lifecycle analysis is actually measuring.
Yes, solar does rely on mining. Yes, it does rely on the transportation of parts and pieces. But the difference is continuity.
With fossil fuels, you drill, you transport, you refine, you burn. Rinse, repeat. With solar, most of the environmental impact occurs before the first electron is generated. The fuel source afterward is sunlight, and panels commonly operate for 25-35 years while degrading very slowly over time, declining in performance at less than 1% annually. Almost everything (roughly 85 to 95%) can be reused or recycled.
Solar panel parts are currently expensive to recycle. Why?
Because there’s not a large, established industry dedicated to it yet. Why? Because. Most. Facilities. Are. Still. Operational. 70% of our current capacity was built after 2019 and has an expected lifespan of 25 to 30 years.
“Fine. What about nuclear?”
Nuclear is a great example of why lifecycle analysis is so important. Nuclear’s lifecycle emissions are low, generally in the same range as (or lower than) wind and solar.
But again, we need to consider mining impacts. Manufacturing, reactor construction. Land use, waste storage, water use, decommissioning. Those are just as significant for nuclear as they are for solar.
The point isn’t that nuclear=bad, solar=good. The point is that every energy source has tradeoffs. Every source has a place.
I won't speak for everyone, but it's rare to find a renewables advocate who thinks one energy source is the solution. Most, including myself, believe we need a diversified energy supply. Fossil fuels often still have a place. But it's important to honestly and accurately weigh pros and cons, and to do so based on all the information that's available.
The same logic applies to foreign ownership. Many solar companies are foreign-owned, and that's a point of contention among critics. But, again, let's compare: so is Shell (UK), BP (UK), Smithfield Foods (China), JBS (Brazil). You’d be hard-pressed to find a major corporation today that doesn’t involve international investors, suppliers, manufacturing, or ownership somewhere in its structure.
So when we argue that “farmland is disappearing under foreign-owned investors” to the “NOT GREEN solar” industry, it’s not entirely a fair yardstick.
And again, at risk of being accused of not staying in my lane...I write about solar because it's useful to us. We’re farmers. We’re farming under solar. We aren’t farming around natural gas refineries or nuclear power plants. That's not to say that those don't have their place. Just that solar has a stronger place for our business right now.
So here’s where I land: criticize solar. Question projects. Debate land use. Question whether environmental regulations are strict enough. Solar, like any other industry, has flaws. We need to question them, and we need to improve.
The question isn’t whether solar has impacts. It does. Every energy source does. The real question is, why is solar the only one people seem determined to put on trial for those impacts?
There’s no “green energy scam.” Energy is complicated. Just like food production is complicated.
But unfortunately, that’s a lot less satisfying than a Facebook meme.
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Philip Higgins
the absolute delicious irony of how hard progressives fight against building alternative energy projects weaponizing (drum roll) environmental law....
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Evan Robinson
I'm not unfamiliar with NIMBYs, but we installed rooftop solar on our house in Seattle despite the relatively lacklustre return projections because of the cloud cover. Still produced ~35% of our annual electricity.
I guess I'm disappointed at your willingness to lump progressives together in unified opposition to alternative energy.
Greedy people of all stripes will use all kinds of excuses when they're really trying to do is keep what they think they have. Galbraith said "The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." but selfishness isn't limited to conservatives, or maybe those you label progressives are secretly conservatives in disguise.
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