Posted on 01/19/2025 10:27:54 AM PST by where's_the_Outrage?
BUCKHOLTS, Texas (AP) — On rural Texas farmland, beneath hundreds of rows of solar panels, a troop of stocky sheep rummage through pasture, casually bumping into one another as they remain committed to a single task: chewing grass.
The booming solar industry has found an unlikely mascot in sheep as large-scale solar farms crop up across the U.S. and in the plain fields of Texas. In Milam County, outside Austin, SB Energy operates the fifth-largest solar project in the country, capable of generating 900 megawatts of power across 4,000 acres (1,618 hectares).
How do they manage all that grass? With the help of about 3,000 sheep, which are better suited than lawnmowers to fit between small crevices and chew away rain or shine.
The proliferation of sheep on solar farms is part of a broader trend — solar grazing — that has exploded alongside the solar industry......
“Solar grazing is probably the biggest opportunity that the sheep industry had in the United States in several generations,” Redden said.
The response to solar grazing has been overwhelmingly positive in rural communities near South Texas solar farms where Redden raises sheep for sites to use, he said.
“I think it softens the blow of the big shock and awe of a big solar farm coming in,” Redden said.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Is the rat population is thriving on all the cooked fowl?
Consider the source.
When you stop laughing, go to a believable source.
4,000 acres = 6.25 Square miles. Takes up a little more space than a coal fired, or natural gas, or nuclear plant.
LOVE THAT. Back in college I used to get into arguments with an avowed Communist. We’d have a heated argument about politics, but then talk friendly about other topics. I once mentioned this cartoon (which was very popular back then) as an analogy of the two of us, and he busted up. First and only time I’ve seen a Communist laugh.
During the 60’s it was the fashion trend in agriculture to put up Harvestore silos, otherwise know a blue idols to the corn gods. It was a time of great profits in agriculture and farmers were told how this would this feed sysstem would make them more profitable and life easier and maybe it did. But then a new fashion came, investors building big cattle lots in the sw where the weather was better.
It took 20 years before the last one was taken down.
Never a hail storm around......
We need to put a stop to this BS and propaganda like this just perpetuates it.
It would be extremely disruptive if they were to find an endangered weed in said fields.
Just sayin’.
The irony here being that the same hypocrites who promote solar farms and grazing by sheep are opposed to free ranging cattle.
By the way, on that cartoon, after punching in for the day, the Sheep Dog would beat the crap out of the Coyote, and then the whistle would blow and they would have lunch together...and then pick up the fighting until quitting time, and punch out.
The polar vortex has temperatures here double digits below zero tonight and there is very little wind. It would be mightily cold in our homes if we had to depend on solar farms and windmills for heat tonight.
Problem is, the solar companies don’t pay their bills.
I have a client with thousands of sheep doing this on the east coast. He uses a meat sheep that does not need to be sheared. I forget the actual breed.
Biggest problem is getting the solar companies to pay their invoices. They don’t have much cash flow.
There is an outgoing controversy among environmentalists!
The real one (minority) are concerning about nature, the other just about global warming.
All “green” energy project are very detrimental to the nature!
So this article seems to try to show that “green” energy project are not total loss, that they can put the land to some use.
If this is the best use of land destroyed by solar projects, it just show how bad these projects really are!
Did he ever grasp that he was Ralph?
Remember the old refrain about why eating meat was bad? It was too wasteful of land to raise cattle, now we have this crap and no one says a peep about wasteful land usage.
My point exactly.
How about a batch of windmills off 25 miles off the Virginia Capes ?
What could wrong when one of those things fail ? It would be expensive to replace just one bad windmill, so…..
…that’s why you want 150 of them so when 30, 40, 50 of them are broken and useless ,they can still claim success !!!
900 megawatts of power
___________________
This is their maximum possible power rating, during clear day, when there is so much energy available, that they are paying you (on the instant wholesale level) to take it away from them. (one secret - the solar cells are very hard to shut down).
Generally, they do not work when people actually need the energy!
From many studies, they barely provide 20% (100-200 Megawatt) of average useful power.
Story by NADIA LATHAN
Lathan is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
AP = Always Propaganda
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