Defending Solar - We Can’t Stop Now!
Lauren Skirball
Policy & Strategy Manager, West
I spent a couple days this week in DC with Solar and Farming Association and Solar Energy Industries Association defending the solar industry. The talk on the hill is about American dominance. Energy dominance may be about onshoring our source of electricity - which solar excels at, but we also know that the backbone of America is our rural economies, which means supporting our rural farms.
The point that hit home the most this week was this: farmers are being forced to consider developing their land - into housing, etc - to sustain their families and livelihoods. Solar is another pressure on developing these agricultural lands, but if we put solar on top of farmland we reap incredible rewards. Landowners get competitive land lease rates for ~40 years. Meanwhile, farm viability is ensured in the long run, with a farming stipend that would otherwise go to lawnmowing under the array. And solar developers gain an easier path through local permitting at a time when no one wants to see disappearing farmland. Agrivoltaics provides these all.
We all know that solar creates domestic manufacturing jobs, energy supply to meet the skyrocketing demand from data centers and AI, and grid resiliency in the face of rising blackouts and brownouts. Solar is an incredibly important part of these solutions, but our industry is at risk.
The clean energy investment tax credit is decades-old tax policy, first passed in the 2005 under Bush. It has stabilized the solar industry to advance out of infancy, and continues to help us secure critical funding of our projects through tax equity investment deals.
Legislators have made it clear anything is on the table to balance the books for the proposed tax cuts. We, in turn, have made it clear the impact of these tax credits is billions of dollars in investment, jobs, and energy, as well as farm viability and the ability to do agrivoltaics.
It’s heartening to see folks on the hill acknowledge the important part solar plays in their districts. SEIA had over 160 industry members on the hill, and the Solar and Farming Association brought farmers, researchers, and developers together to key leadership offices, and watched the spark of excitement light in their eyes. We know that agrivoltaics can’t happen without the tax credits, and members heard that.
My biggest takeaway is we can’t stop now. Offices need to hear why this is important on a personal level, from the folks in their districts. We’re marshaling agrivoltaics farmers, local electeds, and a wide coalition of stakeholders to keep the pressure on. But make no mistake, if we don’t pull together now, the solar industry, agrivoltaics, and agrivoltaic farmers are at risk of losing the clean energy tax credit, and with it, we take a critical hit.
If you’re interested in joining us at the Solar and Farming Association (SAFA) we’d love to have you. Shoot me a message and I’ll get you involved - there’s no time like the present, and we have no time to lose.
