In the past couple of years, my husband and I have sat across the table from folks who wanted to lease our ground for wind turbines. Another group wanted to run a CO2 pipeline across our farm. Within 15 miles of us, solar farms are going up, and at least two companies are seeking data center permits in our county.
Farmland is in a weird set of crosshairs here in our corner of the world, and maybe in yours too.
Is it a business opportunity or unwanted attention? Depending on who you ask, it’s both.
Like it or not, farmland has become an infrastructural landing zone for energy expansion. In rural areas across the U.S., energy developers now turn their focus to farmland as they look to increase U.S. energy capacity.
Why? It’s affordable and ready for construction. And yes, affordable is a relative term. You can’t turn a profit on $40,000-an-acre ground, but a developer won’t blink twice to shell that out if they think it’s best suited for a solar farm or data center.
American Farmland Trust (AFT) projects that more than 10 million acres of land will be needed for solar by 2050. From 2012 to 2020 alone, 3,000 commercial solar projects blanketed 7.25 million acres. Of those in the Midwest, 70% were built on productive farmland.
That’s changing the nature of competition.
Farmers compete for land, not just against neighbors but also institutional investors who can pay top dollar, especially in Illinois, where 56% of land is farmed by someone who doesn’t own it.
Now they must compete with global energy companies for both land and water.
Money or farmland?
Energy projects can increase land value and certainly offer financial opportunities for farmers. A guaranteed check for the next 20 years on a solar or wind project looks pretty good right now.
Matt Riggs is an entrepreneurial young farmer near Urbana, Ill., who launched Riggs Beer Co. with his brother to capitalize on home-grown grains. He could see a tenfold increase in profitability if a proposed 18-acre agrivoltaics project goes forward.
“[Corn and soybeans] are not great markets long term for a small farm,” he said.
Solar arrays can change drainage patterns, turning the farm next door into a swamp. And let’s be real: Driving past good black soil covered in solar panels is a knife in the heart to every farmer.
Projected solar growth is a drop in the bucket compared to the nation’s 900 million farmland acres. Still, more than 80% will likely blanket highly productive farm areas.
“It’s not necessarily the amount of farmland that’s being taken out of production as much as it is the quality of the land that’s being taken out of production,” said AFT’s Greg Plotkin in a recent interview with Farm Progress technology editor Andy Castillo.
Few farmers would disagree.
In pursuit of AI
The rural Midwest is quickly becoming a hub for data centers, which house the digital files that power artificial intelligence, cryptocurrencies, cloud computing, self-driving tractors and more.
That sprayer that can see weeds and blast ’em? It functions with AI, powered by a data center.
To date, Illinois has 222 data centers, with dozens more proposed.
Developer Hut 8 recently unveiled a proposed 500-megawatt data center that would cover 200 acres of farmland in Logan County. The meeting before the Logan County Zoning Economic Development Committee was contentious, to say the least. Residents worry about farmland but also water use. Most data centers use evaporative cooling; a large data center could consume 5 million gallons per day, according to the Environmental and Energy Study Institute.
“It’s a story with no villain — nor a simple solution — because farmers are often the ones selling and buying land,” Castillo recently wrote. “Market factors drive sales. It’s basic capitalism.”
But farmers can be part of the solution, whether they’re cashing in or not. Across rural America, farmers need to advocate for thoughtful planning to balance energy expansion with farmland preservation. Visit with your county board, learn about (usually complex) zoning laws and find out which companies are interested in your county.
Ask good questions and learn from the answers. And don’t believe everything on social media.
This story may not have a villain, but it’s going to need plenty of winners.