Leasing land for solar farms offers farmers an opportunity to diversify their revenue and earn a good income.

This is according to Conall Bolger, CEO of the Irish Solar Energy Association (ISEA) who was responding to an Irish Grain Growers group (IGG) call for a conversation around the use of prime tillage land for solar farms.

Speaking to the Irish Farmers Journal, Bolger said that people are free to make use of their land in a way that they deem fit and it is the planning process which determines whether a development is a suitable use for that land.

He said it is not accurate to claim that 3,000ac have been “lost” to solar farms, as suggested by some tillage farmers. The Irish Solar Energy Association (ISEA) estimates that only 920 to 1,000ac of solar farms have been connected to the grid so far.

Furthermore, panels do not cover the entire area of leased land, so in reality the area under panels is likely closer to 410ac to 550ac, one sixth of the figure quoted, Bolger remarked. He said the land between panels can still be used for grazing small animals.

Pat Smith, chair of the Micro Renewable Energy Federation, said that there will always be competing challenges for a limited resource such as land.

He said that farmers should always have the right to make the best use of their resources for their business and family, whether that means generating renewable energy from technologies like solar PV, growing silage for biomethane production, or converting to forestry. Smith believes that all stakeholders should accept this.

The Government has set a target for 8GW of solar PV by 2030.

The ISEA estimates that the ground-mounted solar portion of that target would require 24,000ac to 26,000ac of solar farms.

This is the equivalent of 0.2% of Ireland’s total area of agricultural land or 3% of the area under tillage.