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Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

mercurialtrends.com

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Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#31

Post by friendswdorthy »

samwillis wrote: post #28
seu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human or AI generated, it's clearly SEO optimized. I think that's the real problem.

Really I blame Google for this, obviously any online publication needs to optimise for traffic, they need to pay the bills. But Google's latest algorithm changes quite clearly prioritise longer prose, and so bulking out text in articles has become the norm. It's a shame, and Google have the resources to do better, but unfortunately not the incentives. Most of the pages have some amount of Google ads on them.

Edit: oh okay just downvote because of an observation. Nice community here!

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#32

Post by lpapez »

Agrivoltaics seems like a cool idea but one of the things I rarely ever see mentioned is how chemicals from the panels interact with the crops. Steel can rust and if rust gets washed away into the earth and then the plants... well that cant be beneficial right? And I bet steel is the least toxic element of the panels.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#33

Post by Throw73849 »

samwillis wrote: post #29
Throw73849 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe use illegal cheap labour from another country. Something like feudalism, but more modern!

You joke, but there are a lot of crops that can't easily be machine picked, and probably never will be. Although I'm a proponent for legal safe immigration for sessional work with a route to permanent residency. The lack of legal routes results in unsafe working conditions and modern slavery.

Why would I joke? People are cheaper than machines.

Edit: "illegal" in terms of work law, minimal salary and safety standards. Legally imported workers are probably even cheaper and easier to exploit!

Until we establish socialism, human labour will always be exploited and cheaper than machines!

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#34

Post by hosh »

This is a specific application of a broader design pattern found in the permaculture world: planting combinations of plants at different canopy layers, ecological functions, and yields. The solar panels would be taking the place of an understory or shrub canopy layer, while there are herbaceous, ground cover, and root zone layers you can work with.

While solar panels have an yield useful for humans, it would be even better if it can participate in the ecological system. Planting instead say, a palo verde would yield edible beans, with the tree itself acting as a nitrogen fixer. A sea buckthorne tree also acts as a nitrogen fixer, with roots propogating (more sea buckthrone trees pops up on its own) and yields high vitamin-c berries.

What ecological function can a solar panel contribute to?

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#35

Post by hosh »

lpapez wrote: post #32

Agrivoltaics seems like a cool idea but one of the things I rarely ever see mentioned is how chemicals from the panels interact with the crops. Steel can rust and if rust gets washed away into the earth and then the plants... well that cant be beneficial right? And I bet steel is the least toxic element of the panels.

There are plants that can do soil remediation on soil with heavy metals, though you can’t eat them and you still have to find a way to process or sequester the heavy metal. Cilantro (coriander) is an example.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#36

Post by kibwen »

lpapez wrote: post #32

Agrivoltaics seems like a cool idea but one of the things I rarely ever see mentioned is how chemicals from the panels interact with the crops. Steel can rust and if rust gets washed away into the earth and then the plants... well that cant be beneficial right? And I bet steel is the least toxic element of the panels.

Iron is often used as a fertilizer, so rusted support beams aren't a problem, either for the plants or for humans. And all the interesting parts of a solar panel are under glass, they aren't being washed away by rain.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#37

Post by hannob »

lpapez wrote: post #32

Agrivoltaics seems like a cool idea but one of the things I rarely ever see mentioned is how chemicals from the panels interact with the crops. Steel can rust and if rust gets washed away into the earth and then the plants... well that cant be beneficial right? And I bet steel is the least toxic element of the panels.

Rust is just iron oxide, which in small quantities is a relatively benign substance. And probably there's more rust coming from old farming equipment than from the (likely high quality, because they are built for expensive solar panels) steel structures here.

The solar cells themselve are mostly made out of silicon, which also isn't a dangerous substance.

I don't think this is an issue.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#38

Post by samwillis »

Throw73849 wrote: post #33
samwillis wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You joke, but there are a lot of crops that can't easily be machine picked, and probably never will be. Although I'm a proponent for legal safe immigration for sessional work with a route to permanent residency. The lack of legal routes results in unsafe working conditions and modern slavery.

Why would I joke? People are cheaper than machines. Edit: "illegal" in terms of work law, minimal salary and safety standards. Legally imported workers are probably even cheaper and easier to exploit! Until we establish socialism, human labour will always be exploited and cheaper than machines!

My mistake, I usually assume someone openly proposing illegal immigration, rather than safe legal immigration, as a solution is joking.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#39

Post by ianai »

samwillis wrote: post #29
Throw73849 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or maybe use illegal cheap labour from another country. Something like feudalism, but more modern!

You joke, but there are a lot of crops that can't easily be machine picked, and probably never will be. Although I'm a proponent for legal safe immigration for sessional work with a route to permanent residency. The lack of legal routes results in unsafe working conditions and modern slavery.

Ah but now supplemented with a push to legalize child labor in the US.

Re: Agrivoltaics: A Sustainable Synergy Between Agriculture and Solar Energy

#40

Post by samwillis »

ianai wrote: post #39
samwillis wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You joke, but there are a lot of crops that can't easily be machine picked, and probably never will be. Although I'm a proponent for legal safe immigration for sessional work with a route to permanent residency. The lack of legal routes results in unsafe working conditions and modern slavery.

Ah but now supplemented with a push to legalize child labor in the US.

Child labour is already legal (to some extent) in agriculture, unfortunately.
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