Here we examine opportunities for scaling up on-farm distributed solar energy projects (either traditional solar panels or agrivoltaics co-located with crop and livestock production).

We also take stock of the development pressures created by utility-scale solar and explore guardrails needed to limit negative impacts on food production and farm profitability.

Farmers and ranchers who install solar arrays can save money by offsetting their energy costs while also contributing to a clean energy future. Many in California do, producing more renewable energy than their counterparts in any other state in the country.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Census of Agriculture shows that the number of Californian farms with solar installations almost tripled between the 2012 and 2017 census. In 2017, almost 14,000 farms in California made up 15 percent of the country’s on-farm solar projects. While the results of the 2022 census are not yet available, it seems likely that this upward trend has continued and, given the investments the Biden Administration is making in renewable energy, could accelerate dramatically in the coming years