by Valdi Weiderpass
New York's Climate Action Council estimated that NY would need 65GW of solar power and 34GW of wind power by 2050 to meet the State’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) mandated goals (See Table 21 of Appendix G: CAC Scoping Plan Appendix-G). The CLCPA requires electricity to be 100% from zero emission sources by 2040, and to cut state greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050. From the Solar Energy Industries Association: "Depending on the specific technology, a utility-scale solar power plant may require between 5 and 10 acres per megawatt (MW) of generating capacity." See link: https://www.seia.org/initiatives/land-use-solar-development
Let's do some arithmetic.
65GW x 1000MW/GW = 65,000MW 65,000MW x 10 acres/MW = 650,000 acres needed (worst case)
65,000MW x 5 acres/MW = 325,000 acres needed (best case)
Total farmland area of NY State = 6.866 million acres (NY Farm Bureau, quoting USDA 2017 Ag Census: https://www.nyfb.org/about/about-ny-ag ).
650,000 acres needed ÷ 6,866,000 NY farm acreage x 100 = 9.5%
Worst case 650,000 acres of solar needed for NY State in 2050 is less than 10% of total NY State farmland.
How much NY farmland is devoted to hay production? 1,240,000 acres of hay was harvested in NY per USDA in 2022.
See https://www.nass.usda.gov/Quick_Stats/Ag_Overview/stateOverview.php?state=NEW%20YORK
The typical NY hay field is cut 3 times per year per: https://www.haytalk.com/threads/newbie-selling-hay-ny.15565/
1,240,000 acres/ 3 cuttings = about 413,000 acres.
How much NY farmland is devoted to pasture for grazing? About 580,000 acres, according to the USDA. See https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/AgCensus/2017/Online_Resources/County_Profiles/New_York/cp99036.pdf
413,000 acres used for hay + 580,000 acres used for pastureland = 993,000 acres
650,000 acres needed for solar ÷ 993,000 acres hay/pasture farmland x 100 = 65.5%
The worst case 650,000 acres of solar needed for NY State in 2050 is less than 2/3 of NY farmland used for hay/pasture, so there is no real need to use prime farmland for solar farms. And the 66% estimate assumes all of the solar would be deployed on farms. This doesn't need to be the case. Much can be put on rooftops, on residential/ business/school property, over parking lots, over municipal landfills, and in some cases on highway medians or along sides of highways. Some types of farming can be done under and among racks of solar panels.
Most farmland loss is from spreading cities and development of suburbs, or from selling off farmland to build rural homes, etc. https://www.seia.org/sites/default/files/2019-11/Solar%20Ag%20Land%20Usage%20FactSheet%202019-PRINT.pdf
Conclusion: Concerns about losing prime farmland should not hold up deployment of solar energy (or wind energy which has a much smaller footprint).
Image: Agronomy Journal, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/07/agrivoltaic-farming-solar-energy/
Jack’s Solar Garden in Longmont, Colorado, a 1.2-megawatt, five-acre community solar farm, is the largest agrivoltaic research project in the United States.
Werner Slocum/NREL, 64436