Mindy O’Neall, 44, was elected the 53rd mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska, in 2025, flipping the seat from Republican to Democrat for the first time in a decade and becoming the fourth female municipal chief executive in the city’s history.

The Iowa native drove a stick-shift pickup truck to Alaska to look for adventure 23 years ago—landing first in Anchorage, where she worked as an aide in the state legislature, and then in Fairbanks, home to roughly 30,000 people including the Fort Wainwright military base. She worked at the Fairbanks Economic Development Corporation and the Interior Gas Utility, served as a labor business representative, and founded Blue Canoe Media, a boutique communications and consulting firm.

At the University of Alaska Fairbanks, O’Neall earned a master’s in communication, researching governance and climate impacts in rural Alaska. Prior to her election as mayor, she served on the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly and was executive director of the Cold Climate Housing Research Center, and also serves on boards of the Alaska State Homebuilders Association and Alaska Municipal League. She campaigned on the issues of downtown revitalization, affordable housing, and public safety. She lives in downtown Fairbanks with her dog, Tito, who she pointed out is the true official dog of Alaska, the mutt.

This interview is also available as a Land Matters podcast.

Anthony Flint: For the uninitiated, what kind of place is Fairbanks? And why did you want to be mayor?

Mindy O’Neall: I would say we’re the land of extremes. We are extremely cold in the winter. Some people may be surprised to learn that we can get up to 90 to 100 degrees in the summer. We have exotic animals, grizzly bears and polar bears, and we have extreme industry, like mining and gas and oil development. At the heart of it is the people … who have grit and determination and oftentimes this mindset of abundance … [and a] mindset of scarcity as well. We’re at the end of the line. We have three to four days of food security at any given time.

I’ve been in Alaska for over 23 years. I’m originally from Iowa, and I came up here just like a lot of other folks, looking for adventure. If you’ve ever been to the Midwest, they say, why would you ever want to leave the heartland? And I said, don’t worry, I’ll be back in a year. I just want to go check it out. And, after a year, it was painfully obvious that there was so much more to discover to Alaska that I just had to stay.

One of the things that’s interesting about Alaska is we have seven boroughs, that are kind of like counties in the lower 48. And then we have cities within those boroughs, and so Fairbanks has a borough that has a governing body, which is the assembly, and a mayor, and then within the borough, there are two cities…. We always like to joke that for a place that’s so against government and overregulation, we have a lot of government.

I started my public service during COVID…. We had a mayor that was on paper doing a fine job. But he was very discriminatory to the Alaska Native population here, and after some comments and blow-ups on social media … I just believe that public service is a privilege, and somebody who is in office has to have the respect of every population that is within their community … [a] key piece of public service is showing your community respect, even if you don’t understand them, even if you don’t agree with them. I think that we have lost that on a lot of levels of government these days.

I do think that one of the benefits of being in this position is being a female. This is the first time Fairbanks has had a female mayor in about two decades, and I’m the fourth one since 1903 … a young female in my 40s, leading this community and being a role model for girls in our community to see that there’s somebody like them … in an environment that is sometimes very hostile and sometimes very male-driven.

AF: Everybody’s wrestling with affordability these days, and one big part of that is housing. What are the policies that can help, in your region, whether homebuying or renting?

MO: We suffer from a housing stock that’s from the ’70s. Alaska really got its last big boom during the oil pipeline of the ’70s, and what happened was there was such an explosion of [people] coming up to the state that they built things the way that they knew how to build things, which was without a lot of insulation, built out of whatever that they had. So we suffer from very inefficient housing.

[We need to focus on] building generational wealth outside of homeownership. Building homes and housing has been the game or the business of large, wealthy developers. And in our community, we just can’t really afford that. We don’t have enough folks for a large developer to make money here.… How can we lower the amount of investment [that is necessary for housing]?

AF: The Lincoln Institute has been helping municipalities identify government-owned land that can be used for affordable housing. Do you see opportunities in that approach?

MO: Absolutely, I do. A few facts for you here. Sixty percent of our land in Alaska is federal, and 25 percent is owned by the state of Alaska. 10 percent is owned by Native corporations, and one percent is private. So we have a lot of government land that’s available. Now, about 80 million of those acres are managed for conservation. But that’s still quite a bit of land left for us to use.

We have a parking structure that has been mothballed for probably five years. The university that used it ended up not needing it, and so they literally welded the doors shut, and this building has been sitting there, kind of deteriorating ever since. There was some funding that became available … for land acquisition. We’ve put out an RFP for a developer to then build two or three stories on top of that parking garage, therefore activating the space, using the garage for parking, covered parking, which is very important in Fairbanks, but also getting units into the downtown core. So, that’s one example, and there’s a few others that we have, but I’m really eager to see how that plays out.

AF: What are the unique challenges of living with climate change in Alaska, and what, at the state and local level, can be done about it?

MO: They often call the Arctic the canary in the coal mine, because we start to see the issues of climate change far beyond and far before the lower 48 or other parts of the world. Something’s been happening in our environment for quite some time. We have more wind in Fairbanks, which means that we have more risk for summer fires. In the winter, we’ve had more snow than usual, and it’s also been colder than usual, which means that our ground will not thaw quickly—meaning that when the temperature gets hot in the air, it’s all going to melt into water, but there’s going to be nowhere for it to go because the ground hasn’t thawed yet. And so now we miss out on that water, and we get lots of floods. And then we don’t have moisture in the ground, and so it’s more susceptible to wildfires in the summer.

I don’t think there’s really much we can do about this now. It’s happening. We’re in a cycle of climatic disruption. But we can plan for it. We can plan for extreme events—what we’re going to do when the power goes out and it’s negative 30 degrees.

The other thing is, with planning comes money, and Alaska is a place where we do not collect sales taxes on a statewide basis. Some municipalities do, we do not, as the municipality of Fairbanks. And income taxes. So we pay property taxes, and that’s all we pay. As we address these more and more dramatic events, it’s costing us more and more to repair the roads, costing more and more to protect the utilities that are above and below ground. We’re seeing less and less investment from the federal government for events like that. So as Alaskans, it’s time for us to really think hard about how we want to protect … our assets that we have. And what level of commitment comes from our own pocketbooks.

AF: Leading into that, how have you navigated being a mayor at a time when the federal government is reducing funding, and withdrawing from being a partner on so many issues?

MO: We continue to ask our public employees to do more with less. At the same time, the public expects services to be modern. So, that means we have to invest in technology.

It’s a tough spot. I have all of these ideas and plans for being mayor, and then you come into the office.… The way we want to provide services and make things more efficient … with less and less funding, from the state and from the federal government, we’re going to have to look at ways that we contribute to ourselves. And that comes back to the values that we hold as a community.

It’s tough. It’s definitely something I’m working on—how we do more with less, how we explain the value of good governance, [and] putting our own skin in the game.

Anthony Flint is a senior fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, host of the Land Matters podcast, and a contributing editor of Land Lines.

Lead image: The Midnight Sun Festival in downtown Fairbanks, Alaska. Credit: Jacob Boomsma via iStock/Getty Images.

When the next big hurricane hits New Orleans —it’s not really an if, unfortunately —residents want to be prepared with a thoughtful, equitable evacuation strategy. Maybe even a plan for permanent relocation, if it comes to that.

The mass evacuation from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 was tragic and traumatizing for so many residents; it’s not a process anyone would want to repeat. But low-lying areas of New Orleans—much of which is built on drained marshland that continues to sink—are still very much at risk from flooding and hurricane damage.

“We all were forced to relocate after Hurricane Katrina, some for months, and some for years,” says Beth Butler, executive director of A Community Voice (ACV), a resident-led organization serving New Orleans’ 7th, 8th, and 9th wards. “Then we were able to cobble together our lives back here, and yet, at the same time, as climate change [has intensified], what we’re finding is that for six months every year during hurricane season, we’re under the threat of completely losing everything,” she says.

With newly announced support from the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, ACV will partner with the Climigration Network and Buy-In Community Planning over the next year and a half to use exploratory scenario planning to help residents design and think through a range of possible futures related to relocation. That includes deciding if, and how, they would want to move out of harm’s way as climate risk intensifies.

“The reality is that if this event takes place, we will have nowhere to stay. We will not be able to return home,” says ACV chairperson and treasurer Debra Campbell. “And it’s inevitable that this will happen, but we do need to make a plan, because the city is not making a plan for us.”

Exploratory scenario planning is a type of community visioning process in which participants consider a range of possible futures—including the external or driving forces that might create such scenarios, and the actions or responses each might demand of the community.

Campbell has been working with Buy-In Community Planning to survey residents about their past evacuation experiences and what a more intentional relocation process should look like. Among the considerations residents have raised—such as more evacuee bus stops for people with limited mobility, and better mental health support, particularly for children—was the importance of a culturally aware receiving community that would allow families and friends to stay together. After Katrina, “We were scattered around the United States like cockroaches,” Campbell says, “forced to stay in places where we didn’t feel welcomed.”

With the help of the Climigration Network, A Community Voice has been meeting with the mayors of smaller cities a few hours up the Mississippi River from New Orleans, exploring options for temporary or permanent resettlement. As a short-term goal, Campbell says the group might like to secure a large building where 70 or more residents could evacuate together. (Some residents already have evacuation plans with family members outside the city.)

“I think that would be a start,” Campbell says. “Now, if something should happen where we would have to stay longer, in Natchez, [Mississippi], there are houses that they need renovated, so maybe that’s something to consider; we’d wind up in their community and not in an isolated area, and that would be one of the quicker things to do, rather than build from the ground up.”

In an example of community-driven, participatory scenario planning, members of A Community Voice will lead their fellow residents in collaborative workshops to design, test, and refine four to six potential relocation scenarios. ACV hopes the engagement design could create a model for other communities facing climate challenges and similarly difficult questions about the future.

“Sometimes it’s hard for people to confront the fact that we might have to relocate,” Butler says. “Even though, in the back of everyone’s mind, they know it—because we already had to do it once.”

The New Orleans project is one of four climate mobility-focused exploratory scenario planning proposals recently selected for support through the Lincoln Institute’s Consortium for Scenario Planning. The chosen projects span multiple continents, contexts, and climate risks, says Heather Hannon, director of planning practice and scenario planning at the Lincoln Institute.

“Our team believes exploratory scenario planning will be a valuable tool for these communities confronting dynamic and complex uncertainties around climate mobility,” Hannon says. “It’s a participatory and creative framework that brings together a wide range of people to imagine a range of futures and then co-develop strategies to help them adapt as the future unfolds. We look forward to learning from these projects and helping other communities do similar work.”

Some of the other projects selected include:

• An interdisciplinary team of researchers and practitioners will host XSP workshops in three urban regions of Brazil, each facing different climate mobility challenges: Florianópolis, a populous coastal island with increasing flooding risks; Porto Alegre, where large-scale flooding displaced thousands of residents and exposed systemic vulnerabilities in 2024; and São Paulo, Brazil’s largest metropolis and a key destination for internal migrants.
• The Nuvoni Centre for Innovation Research will introduce exploratory scenario planning as an anticipatory tool for low-income settlements in Nairobi, Kenya, where 2024 rains and flooding caused loss of life and property in riverside communities—with a focus on Mukuru, which is experiencing both mass displacement and in-migration due to affordable housing interventions.

The projects were selected as part of an RFP process managed by the Consortium for Scenario Planning. Past projects have focused on disaster recovery and resilience (2024), housing affordability (2023), changing food systems (2022), climate strategies (2021), and equity and low-growth scenarios (2020).

Learn more about Lincoln Institute RFPs, fellowships, and research opportunities.

Jon Gorey is staff writer at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy.

Lead image: Downtown Natchez, Mississippi. Credit: Wayne Hsieh via Flickr/Creative Commons.

The politics of energy in the US lately seem to have dimmed the immediate-term prospects of solar power. But squint a little and you can see a sunnier vision for this form of renewable energy. In truth, photovoltaic technology continues to grow ever more cost-effective as a means to address not just climate change but energy needs in general. And because demand for solar energy means demand for space to situate solar panels or panel arrays, recent years have seen a rise in innovative dual-use solar projects, which combine space for clean electricity generation with complementary uses.

One prominent—and promising—example is the rise of agrivoltaics: using elevated solar panels on agricultural land, allowing farm animals to graze or crops to grow among panel rows. Globally, the deployment of agrivoltaic projects has grown significantly in recent years, from generating a collective 5 megawatts of peak energy in 2012 to 14 gigawatts in 2021. (For context, one gigawatt is roughly enough to simultaneously power every home in a city the size of San Francisco.)

The strategy caught on first in European and southeast Asian countries with limited arable land, as a means of achieving renewable energy targets without sacrificing agricultural capacity or food security. The concept of combining solar energy generation with agriculture dates back to at least the 1980s, and the term “agrivoltaics” was coined in 2011 by French researcher Christian Dupraz at the Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRAé) in studies exploring the benefits of combined land use.

In Japan, pioneer Akira Nagashima analyzed crop growth below photovoltaic modules within the first research pilot systems in 2004 and promoted the technology as “solar sharing.” Thanks in part to governmental support beginning in 2012, Japan now counts more than 3,000 small-scale agrivoltaic systems. In 2014, China installed the first large-scale agrivoltaic systems and remains the country with the largest installed capacity in the world. In Europe, the first prototype of a suspended mobile solar panel system was built in Austria in 2007. France was the first European country to systematically support agrivoltaics in the late 2010s; Germany, Italy, and others have since developed their own programs.

The US has been slower to adopt the practice, but a map maintained by the National Lab of the Rockies InSPIRE team shows more than 600 such projects around the country today. As recently as ten years ago “there wasn’t a map, and there was none of this happening” in the US, says Matthew Sturchio, a faculty affiliate in ecology at Colorado State University whose research focuses on ecovoltaic projects more broadly. Some of Sturchio’s recent research focused on grassland management in the Front Range of Colorado, finding that shade from raised solar panels can mitigate the effects of chronic aridity, as well as unusually hot and dry seasons. Studies by researchers in Arizona and elsewhere have similarly addressed the role solar can play in addressing arid climate impacts on crops and rangelands.

The configuration of ecovoltaic systems varies based on their goals and context. Some designs feature widely spaced panel rows that allow tractors and farm equipment to operate between them. Others employ elevated mounting structures that raise panels high enough to leave room for grazing livestock or tall crops beneath. Fixed-tilt systems offer simplicity and lower costs, while tracking systems that follow the sun’s path can optimize both energy generation and crop light exposure throughout the day. Research from the University of Arizona found that tomatoes, peppers, and other vegetables grown under solar panels showed increased production compared to traditional full-sun cultivation, while using significantly less water.

The most popular application of agrivoltaics in the US involves grazing livestock beneath and around solar panels. Of 250 or so projects involving livestock in 2025, more than 230 include sheep, according to Inside Climate News (resulting in the irresistible term “lambscaping.”) The American Solar Grazing Association estimates US solar sites now host about 5,000 sheep.

The steady proliferation of dual-use efforts underscores the growing recognition that renewable energy is partly a land use issue. “Most of our responses to climate change implicate land to some degree,” notes Patrick Welch, associate director of urban sustainability at the Lincoln Institute, who says even in the context of renewables, not all those implications are wise. “You see examples of forests being clearcut to place a large-scale solar farm,” he continues, or solar displacing agricultural areas. “So you’re taking away land that was providing a function.” And those instances can also spark public opposition to renewable projects more broadly.

“Our responses to climate change, most of them, to some degree implicate land,” notes Patrick Welch, associate director of urban sustainability at the Lincoln Institute, and even in the context of renewables not all those implications are wise. “You see examples of forests being clearcut to then place a large-scale solar farm,” he continues, or solar displacing agricultural areas. “So you’re taking away land that was providing a function.” And those instances can also spark public opposition to renewable projects.

The upshot has been increased emphasis on making the most of land and other surfaces that don’t involve displacement. Welch points to geospatial analysis by the Chesapeake Conservancy’s Conservation Innovation Center (CIC) that concludes that sites like rooftops, parking canopies, industrial lands, and degraded properties could add up to enough space to support Maryland’s renewable energy goals. “Local context matters a lot,” Welch says, “but there are ways to resolve these conflicts over land use that are kind of more win-win.”

That goes beyond traditional agriculture projects. Grassland solar installations can also be havens for pollinators—the bees, butterflies, and other insects essential to agricultural productivity and ecosystem health; even neighboring farms could enjoy improved pollination levels that can boost crop yields. Several US states including Minnesota have developed pollinator-friendly solar standards and incentive programs.

Another dual-use solar application—dubbed “floatovoltaics”—deploys panels on pontoons atop reservoirs, irrigation ponds, and aeration basins at wastewater treatment facilities, generating clean energy without consuming land. The surrounding water cools the panels, which can increase their efficiency by several percentage points compared to ground-mounted systems in hot climates. Simultaneously, the panels shade the water surface, reducing evaporation—a critical benefit in drought-prone regions.

Studies suggest floating solar can reduce reservoir evaporation by 70 percent or more in covered areas, preserving substantial water volumes for irrigation or municipal use. In agricultural contexts, floating solar on irrigation reservoirs allows farmers to generate income from generating electricity while improving water conservation. Japan, South Korea, and China have become global leaders in this technology, with installations ranging from small farm ponds to massive reservoir-scale projects. As the technology matures and costs decline, floating solar is expanding into new markets, particularly in Southeast Asia and South America, where appropriate water bodies are available.

According to market researcher Exactitude Consultancy, the overall global floating-solar market was valued at approximately $8.7 billion in 2025 and is projected to soar to more than $75 billion by 2034. Other estimates vary, but the trend is toward growth. The Asia-Pacific region continues to lead global deployment; Japan makes up about 14 percent of the global market revenue in 2024, and the world’s largest installation is currently the Dezhou Dingzhuang Floating Solar Farm in China, which generates around 550 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year, enough to power 50,000 homes. Dual-use projects have limits, of course. Agrivoltaic systems typically cost more to construct than conventional ground-mounted solar, requiring specialized mounting structures, increased spacing between panels, and other considerations that complicate design. Agricultural integration can also involve constraints that may reduce overall energy generation compared to single-purpose solar arrays.

Cost remains a challenge for floatovoltaics, too: Analysis suggests that the cost of energy from such systems may be around 20 percent higher than from ground-mounted photovoltaic systems, largely due to specialized flotation equipment. Still, the lower land acquisition costs and higher energy yields from water-cooled panels help offset those costs. And as deployment spreads and the technology matures, the cost premium should continue to decline.

Meanwhile, policy and regulatory frameworks haven’t always kept pace with new technology and new ideas, and adjusting these frameworks to recognize and reward dual-use approaches can be a challenge. But as energy demands continue to grow, and solar remains a key option, the benefits are undeniable. For example, life cycle assessment research focused on grazing has found that agrivoltaics produces 3.9 percent less emissions and 0.5 percent less energy demand compared to conventional photovoltaic systems and sheep grazing separately. “The point of ecovoltaics is looking at where you are in the world, and what is the type of ecosystem service that would be most useful on this landscape,” Sturchio says.

While some funding may be on hold for the moment, the larger trend is clear, he says. “No matter what the social opinion of solar is, it is happening and it is happening in large scale. So we all want to know what the best version of this is, if there’s a best version, what the trade-offs are, what the synergies are.” In Europe and Southeast Asia, some countries may end up using 10 to 20 percent of their agricultural land for dual-use projects.

Technological refinement will likely improve the economics and performance of these solar experiments. Semi-transparent solar panels that allow controlled light transmission, for example, could enable even more flexible agrivoltaic designs. Advances in mounting structures, panel efficiency, and agricultural techniques specifically adapted to solar integration also seem likely.

Politics notwithstanding, climate change will continue to pressure both energy systems and agricultural productivity. Given that dual-use solar projects offer a pathway that addresses both challenges, their future looks bright.

Rob Walker is the author of City Tech: 20 Apps, Ideas, and Innovators Changing the Urban Landscape and The Art of Noticing. More of his writing can be found at robwalker.substack.com.

Lead image: Sheep and solar panels coexist in a field in Germany. Credit: Frederick Doerschem via iStock/Getty Images Plus.

Recientemente, la política energética de los Estados Unidos parece haber opacado las perspectivas a corto plazo de la energía solar. Sin embargo, si entrecerramos un poco los ojos, tendremos una visión más brillante de esta forma de energía renovable. Porque, en realidad, la tecnología fotovoltaica es cada vez más rentable como medio para abordar no solo el cambio climático, sino también las necesidades energéticas en general, que continúan en aumento. Y debido a que la demanda de energía solar significa demanda de espacio para colocar paneles solares o matrices de paneles, en los últimos años, se observó un marcado crecimiento en proyectos solares innovadores de doble uso, que dan un uso complementario al espacio dedicado a la generación de electricidad limpia.

Un ejemplo destacado y prometedor es el aumento de los sistemas agrivoltaicos: el uso de paneles solares elevados en tierras agrícolas, que permite que los animales de granja pasten o que los cultivos crezcan entre las filas de paneles. A nivel mundial, el despliegue de proyectos agrivoltaicos creció en forma significativa en los últimos años, y pasó de generar un total de 5 megavatios de energía en hora pico en 2012 a 14 gigavatios en 2021. (Un poco de contexto: un gigavatio resulta casi suficiente para alimentar en simultáneo cada hogar en una ciudad del tamaño de San Francisco).

La estrategia se impuso por primera vez en los países europeos y del sudeste asiático como medio para alcanzar los objetivos de energía renovable sin sacrificar la capacidad agrícola ni la seguridad alimentaria, ya que cuentan con una capacidad limitada de suelo cultivable. El concepto de combinar la generación de energía solar con la agricultura se remonta al menos a la década de 1980, y el investigador francés Christian Dupraz en el Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRAé) acuñó el término “agrivoltaico” en 2011 en estudios de los beneficios del uso combinado del suelo.

En Japón, el pionero Akira Nagashima analizó el crecimiento de los cultivos debajo de los módulos fotovoltaicos dentro de los primeros sistemas piloto de investigación en 2004 y promovió la tecnología con el nombre “energía solar compartida”. Desde 2012, y gracias en parte al apoyo gubernamental, Japón ahora cuenta con más de 3.000 sistemas agrivoltaicos a pequeña escala. En 2014, China instaló los primeros sistemas agrivoltaicos a gran escala y sigue siendo el país con la mayor capacidad instalada del mundo. En Europa, el primer prototipo de un sistema de paneles solares móviles suspendidos se construyó en Austria en 2007. Francia fue el primer país europeo en dar apoyo sistemático al uso agrivoltaico a finales de la década de 2010; desde entonces, Alemania, Italia y otros países desarrollaron sus propios programas.

Los Estados Unidos se demoraron un poco más en adoptar la práctica, pero un mapa realizado por la organización de investigación energética OpenEI muestra más de 600 proyectos de este tipo en todo el país en la actualidad. Hace tan solo diez años “no existía un mapa y nada de esto sucedía” en los Estados Unidos, indica Matthew Sturchio, un profesor asociado en Ecología de la Universidad Estatal de Colorado cuya investigación se centra en proyectos ecovoltaicos de manera más amplia. Parte de las investigaciones recientes de Sturchio se centraron en el manejo de pastizales en la Front Range de Colorado, y revelaron que la sombra de los paneles solares elevados puede mitigar los efectos de la aridez crónica, así como los efectos de estaciones inusualmente cálidas y secas. Los estudios realizados por investigadores en Arizona y otros lugares han abordado, de manera similar, la función que la energía solar puede desempeñar en reducir los impactos del clima árido en los cultivos y los pastizales.

La configuración de los sistemas ecovoltaicos varía en función de los objetivos y el contexto. Algunos diseños cuentan con filas de paneles muy espaciados que permiten que los tractores y el equipo agrícola operen entre ellos. Otros emplean estructuras de montaje elevadas que mantienen los paneles suspendidos a una altura suficiente para dejar espacio para el pastoreo del ganado o los cultivos de alturas considerables debajo. Los sistemas de inclinación fija ofrecen simplicidad y menores costos, mientras que los sistemas de seguimiento (que siguen la trayectoria del sol) pueden optimizar tanto la generación de energía como la exposición a la luz de los cultivos durante todo el día. Una investigación de la Universidad de Arizona descubrió que los tomates, los pimientos y otras verduras cultivadas bajo paneles solares tuvieron mayores rindes en comparación con el cultivo tradicional a pleno sol, al tiempo que usaban mucha menos cantidad de agua.

La aplicación más popular de los sistemas agrivoltaicos en los Estados Unidos implica el pastoreo de ganado debajo y alrededor de los paneles solares. De los alrededor de 250 proyectos con ganado en 2025, más de 230 correspondían a ganado ovino, según Inside Climate News (lo que resulta el irresistible término en inglés “lambscaping”, que combina las palabras “lamb [cordero]” y “scaping [paisajismo]”. Una aproximación en español podría ser “paisajismo ovino”). La American Solar Grazing Association (Asociación Estadounidense de Pastoreo Solar) estima que los sitios solares de los Estados Unidos ahora albergan alrededor de 5.000 ovejas.

La proliferación constante de esfuerzos de doble uso subraya el creciente reconocimiento de que abordar el desarrollo de la energía renovable es en parte un problema de uso del suelo. “La mayoría de nuestras respuestas al cambio climático implican hasta cierto punto el suelo”, señala Patrick Welch, director asociado de Sostenibilidad Urbana del Instituto Lincoln, e incluso en el contexto de las energías renovables no todas esas implicaciones son acertadas. “Se ven ejemplos de bosques talados para, luego, colocar una granja solar a gran escala”, o el desplazamiento de usos agrícolas, continúa. “Se está utilizando suelo que brindaba otra función”. Y esas instancias también pueden provocar la oposición pública a los proyectos de energía renovable.

La consecuencia ha sido un mayor énfasis en aprovechar al máximo el suelo y otras superficies que no implican desplazamiento. Welch señala el ejemplo del análisis geoespacial de alta resolución del Centro de Innovación para la Conservación (CIC, por sus siglas en inglés) de Chesapeake Conservancy, que concluye que las instalaciones como techos, marquesinas de estacionamiento, terrenos industriales y propiedades degradadas podrían sumar espacio suficiente para respaldar los objetivos de energía renovable de Maryland. Los proyectos de doble uso pueden ser otra solución productiva. “El contexto local es muy importante”, comenta Welch, “pero hay formas de resolver estos conflictos sobre el uso del suelo de una manera que sea más beneficiosa para todos”.

La idea va más allá de los proyectos agrícolas tradicionales. Las instalaciones solares en pastizales también pueden ser refugios para los polinizadores: las abejas, las mariposas y otros insectos esenciales para la productividad agrícola y la salud del ecosistema; incluso las granjas vecinas podrían disfrutar de mejores niveles de polinización que pueden aumentar los rendimientos de los cultivos. Varios estados de los Estados Unidos desarrollaron estándares solares y programas de incentivos amigables con los polinizadores; Minnesota fue pionera en la legislación que establece pautas para el manejo de la vegetación que fomenta la polinización.

Otra aplicación solar de doble uso, denominada sistemas “flotovoltaicos”, despliega paneles en pontones sobre embalses, estanques de riego y cuencas de aireación en instalaciones de tratamiento de aguas residuales, a fin de generar energía limpia sin ocupar suelo que puede destinarse a otros usos. El agua enfría los paneles, porque el proceso de evaporación absorbe el calor del aire circundante y porque el agua tiende a absorber el calor, y mantiene la temperatura del aire por encima de la superficie más fría que si estuviesen instalados por encima del suelo. Esto puede aumentar la eficiencia de los paneles en varios puntos porcentuales en comparación con los sistemas montados en el suelo en climas cálidos. A la vez, los paneles dan sombra a la superficie del agua y reducen la evaporación, un beneficio clave en las regiones propensas a la sequía.

Los estudios sugieren que la energía solar flotante puede reducir la evaporación del reservorio en un 70 por ciento o más en áreas cubiertas, y preservar volúmenes sustanciales de agua para riego o uso municipal. En contextos agrícolas, la energía solar flotante en los embalses de riego permite a los agricultores generar ingresos a partir de la generación de electricidad al tiempo que mejora la conservación del agua. Japón, Corea del Sur y China se convirtieron en líderes mundiales en esta tecnología, con instalaciones que van desde pequeños estanques agrícolas hasta proyectos masivos a escala de represa. A medida que la tecnología madura y los costos disminuyen, la energía solar flotante se expande a nuevos mercados, en particular en el sudeste asiático y América del Sur, que cuentan con cuerpos de agua apropiados disponibles.

Según la investigadora de mercado Exactitude Consultancy, el mercado global total de energía solar flotante se valoró en alrededor de USD 8.700 millones en 2025 y se proyecta que se disparará a más de USD 75.000 millones para 2034. Otras estimaciones varían, pero la tendencia es en alza. La región de Asia-Pacífico continúa liderando el despliegue global; Japón representa alrededor del 14 por ciento de los ingresos del mercado global en 2024, y la instalación más grande del mundo en la actualidad es la Granja Solar Flotante Dezhou Dingzhuang en China, que genera alrededor de 550 millones de kilovatios-hora de electricidad por año, suficiente para servir de suministro a 50.000 hogares. Por supuesto que los proyectos de doble uso tienen límites. En general, los sistemas agrivoltaicos cuestan más que los sistemas solares convencionales montados directamente en el suelo, y requieren estructuras de montaje especializadas, mayor espacio entre los paneles y otras consideraciones que complican el diseño. La integración agrícola también puede implicar restricciones que pueden reducir la generación general de energía en comparación con las instalaciones solares de un solo propósito.

El costo también es un desafío para la energía flotovoltaica: el análisis sugiere que el costo de la energía de los sistemas de generación flotantes puede ser alrededor de un 20 por ciento más alto que el de los sistemas fotovoltaicos montados en el suelo, en gran parte debido a los equipos de flotación especializados. Aun así, los menores costos de adquisición de suelo y los mayores rendimientos de energía de los paneles refrigerados por agua ayudan a compensar esos costos. Y, a medida que la implementación se extiende y la tecnología madura, el mayor costo frente a otros sistemas debería seguir disminuyendo.

Mientras tanto, los marcos normativos y regulatorios no siempre siguieron el ritmo de las nuevas tecnologías y las nuevas ideas, y adaptar estos marcos para reconocer y recompensar los enfoques de doble uso puede ser un desafío. Pero a medida que la demanda de energía sigue creciendo y la energía solar sigue siendo una opción clave, los beneficios son innegables. Por ejemplo, según investigaciones de evaluación del ciclo de vida centrada en el pastoreo, la generación agrivoltaica produce un 3,9 por ciento menos de emisiones y un 0,5 por ciento menos de demanda de energía en comparación con los sistemas fotovoltaicos convencionales y el pastoreo de ovejas por separado. “El punto de la energía ecovoltaica es ver en qué lugar del mundo se pretende instalar y cuál es el tipo de servicio ecosistémico que sería más útil en este entorno”, comenta Sturchio.

Si bien la financiación es limitada por el momento, la tendencia más amplia es clara: “No importa cuál sea la opinión de la sociedad sobre la energía solar, está sucediendo y está sucediendo a gran escala. Así que todos queremos saber cuál es la mejor versión, si hay una mejor que la otra, qué hay que resignar y cuáles son las sinergias”. En Europa y el sudeste asiático, es posible que algunos países terminen utilizando entre el 10 por ciento y el 20 por ciento de las tierras agrícolas para proyectos de doble uso.

Es probable que el refinamiento tecnológico mejore la economía y el rendimiento de estos experimentos solares. Por ejemplo, los paneles solares semitransparentes que permiten la transmisión controlada de la luz podrían permitir diseños agrivoltaicos aún más flexibles. También es posible que surjan avances en las estructuras de montaje, la eficiencia de los paneles y las técnicas agrícolas específicamente adaptadas a la integración solar.

A pesar de las decisiones políticas, el cambio climático continuará presionando tanto los sistemas energéticos como la productividad agrícola, y los proyectos solares de doble uso ofrecen un camino que aborda ambos desafíos; por ende, su futuro se ve brillante.

Rob Walker es el autor de Tecnociudad: 20 aplicaciones, ideas e innovadores que cambian el panorama urbano y The Art of Noticing. Conozca más de sus trabajos en robwalker.substack.com.

Imagen principal: Ovejas pastando en una pradera de paneles solares en Alemania. Los paneles solares elevados permiten que el ganado pueda descansar en la sombra y pastar a sus alrededores. Crédito: Frederick Doerschem via iStock/Getty Images Plus.