Solar energy transitions on agricultural land: soil health impacts from site construction and on-site sheep grazing

Abstract/Summary:

Utility-scale solar energy infrastructure in the U.S. has rapidly expanded through the first decades of the 21st Century. In many regions, much of this development has taken place on agricultural land, in some cases billed as a means of preserving agricultural land for the future by removing the panels after retirement and returning the land to food production. While this may indeed be true, relatively little is known of the ecological effects of utility-scale solar development and land use, particularly those that pertain to future or concurrent agricultural uses.