American Solar Grazing Association (ASGA)

Solar grazing getting a little more press in Texas. Short conversation I had with Texas Monthly a few months ago. #solargrazing https://lnkd.in/gBr8cEmT

One of the most common questions we get asked is “Do we lamb out ewes at solar sites?” Yes, we do. In Texas, our main sheep flocks never leave the site. They have all the grass they can eat and shade most anywhere they want to stop and take a nap. Not much more a sheep can ask for!

In August, ASGA launched Round 2 of our U.S. Solar Grazing Census in partnership with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. This second round is a follow-up to our initial Census released in 2023, and gives us the opportunity to get back in touch with active solar graziers. Through this, we are able to gain more insight into individual grazing operations and allow graziers the chance to update us if their operations have grown since Round 1. We'll be closing Round 2 on Friday (10/25), and have begun working on our final Census Report. The two rounds of the Census have provided valuable information for ASGA, NREL, and the solar grazing industry. We are excited to wrap everything up and share our final Report by the end of the year! Thank you to those who have participated, and if any active solar graziers would still like to complete Round 2 of the Solar Grazing Census, please use the following link: https://tally.so/r/w8Gaex

Early bird registration for the 2025 Virginia Solar Summit is now open! Join us for the region’s foremost solar + land use development event's return to the Richmond Marriott April 28-30 for three days and nights of high impact educational programming and exceptional networking! Co-Hosted again by the Virginia Department of Energy, attendees can expect another collaborative, constructive, and extremely substantive solar energy development event, now in its sixth edition. Featuring the region’s foremost minds, and hands, and hosting many national luminaries in energy, environment and economic development as well, the 2025 Virginia Solar Summit will again gather an uncommon interdisciplinary diversity of professionals for one of the industry’s most immersive and enriching conference experiences! VSS25’s focus tracks are (1) agrivoltaics (or dual-use) and (2) solar redevelopment (or brightfield redevelopment), as well as feature sessions exploring growing issues in O&M and vegetation management, workforce development, siting and land use, and community engagement. And new elements elevating 2025’s experience include: enhanced networking, an expanded poster gallery, a consolidated expo hall, and (potential) mobile tour(s)! Don’t miss this opportunity to add your spark to Greater Virginia‛s brightest future for three brilliant days of connection, education and inspiration in 2025‛s most substantive, must-attend solar energy development event! Join us April 28-30 at the Richmond Marriott to plug in with Greater Virginia’s most professional and passionate assembly of solar development people, and some of the most kind, most constructive folks you’ll find anywhere! Register now on Eventbrite: https://lnkd.in/d9uumZVZ Or visit the Virginia Solar Summit website to learn more: https://lnkd.in/gwzTkTy #solar #energy #environment #landuse #economicdevelopment #agrivoltaics #brownfields #brightfields

If you're following agrivoltaics news and solar graziers here, you've probably seen quite a few posts about bringing other animals on to solar sites - cows, pigs, maybe even ducks. The concept of "multi-species" grazing on solar sites holds interesting possibilities for quality vegetation management and getting the maximum value out of animal grazing. It also presents opportunities for farmers to diversify their commodity income and attract additional support for agrivoltaics and solar development from the agricultural industry and farming communities. Multi-species grazing also has its potential pitfalls. Larger animals like cattle could be more difficult to manage on solar sites and would require upgraded water infrastructure. They also aren't quite the targeted grazing machines that sheep or goats are, but have particular roles within a targeted grazing system. There are economic costs to modify solar site design and construction to accommodate cattle and potentially to accommodate goats, if that is in the cards. The economic barriers are perhaps the biggest roadblock at the moment. On the other hand, sheep are perfectly made to graze under convention solar arrays. These are all exciting questions and problems to untangle. As the leading solar grazing association, ASGA and its members are carefully looking at the future avenues for animal grazing on solar sites. I have no doubt that innovative solar graziers will figure out what works and devise a number of good paths forward that fit different situations (community vs utility, conventional vs modified site design) in different regions of the country. Since solar grazing is a (very unique) outgrowth of the targeted grazing industry, we're putting on an educational workshop to tackle the multi-species grazing question from that important targeted grazing perspective. This Thursday 10/24 at 7:00pm ET, we'll host the workshop with the always informative Dan Macon, who is one of the best targeted grazing experts out there. He currently serves as the livestock and natural resources advisor for the Central Sierra office of the University of California Cooperative Extension. During the workshop, Dan will go over what the general benefits are for targeted grazing with a combination of sheep and cattle, as well as goats. Then we'll open it up and talk with ASGA Members about the potential upsides and downsides to doing this on solar. The workshop is on our network and for ASGA Members. If you're not a member, consider joining here: https://lnkd.in/e2VYdy-b If you're an ASGA Member, you can find the event and RSVP by going to the events section of the network: https://lnkd.in/g3iAR9yt

Holy sheep! A flock of 100 sheep is grazing at the MMWEC/Master Sergeant Alexander Cotton Memorial Solar Project. The flock, owned by Solar Shepherd's Dan Finnegan, is maintaining the vegetation around the 35-acre, 7 megawatt project. By controlling the vegetation, the sheep ensure the panels have better visibility leading to increased solar production and reduce the amount of noise and air pollution caused by gas-powered mowing equipment. These furry friends will remain on site until mid-October and return in the spring.

The future for #agrivoltaics in New Jersey got a little brighter this week. We're proud to partner with Rutgers on our Technical Assistance Program for Agrivoltaics Systems (TAPAS) program and look forward to opportunities to replicate the program in other states.

The weather is getting cooler here in South Texas and these boys are loving it!!!

Join us on November 6th at 6:00pm ET for our next monthly ASGA webinar: "ASGA Call 82: Tools for Solar Pollinator Vegetation Planning + Grazing Compatibility" On the call, we will have the excellent Dan Salas tell us about the PHASE tool and what goes into planning and managing pollinator vegetation on solar sites. Lexie Hain will also join us to talk about sheep grazing and pollinator compatibility. The event is open to the public - feel free to the RSVP link share widely: https://lu.ma/h1xmr6vp More about the event: Pollinator vegetation on solar sites has become an increasingly important component of solar site development, especially as communities and states institute new requirements and incentives. Designing, installing, establishing, and maintaining plant communities on large solar arrays can be costly and complex, and getting it wrong can be costly. To help the solar industry navigate the use of pollinator vegetation, the Pollinator Habitat Aligned with Solar Energy (PHASE) project, funded by a U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office grant, created a series of tools to help developers, owners, and land managers navigate vegetation management decisions. For this webinar, Dan Salas of the University of Illinois Chicago, will discuss several tools provided by the PHASE project to help plan and implement pollinator vegetation, including tools cost comparison, seed mix selection, and pollinator implementation manual. He’ll cover case studies of developers using the tools for planning vegetation on their sites. During the presentation, we’ll also discuss what would be needed to expand these vegetation management tools to plan for sites with pollinators and grazing and what might go into tools for designing grazing on sites. That conversation will touch on the compatibility of grazing sheep on sites seeded for pollinator habitats.

Join us tomorrow (10/16) at 8:00pm ET for the next Grazing with Cam! Camren Maierle (American Lamb Board) will be joined by Dr. Andrew Weaver for an interactive discussion to talk about pregnancy detection and answer your questions. In addition to the open forum, this will be a great networking opportunity as we'll also breakout into small group discussions and you'll be able to meet and introduce yourself to other ASGA members. If you'd like to join our network to stream this event and catch-up on past recordings, sign up here: https://lnkd.in/e2VYdy-b ASGA members can access the Zoom link and RSVP for the event at: https://lnkd.in/gEWRvhpq