U.S. Department of Energy
October 24, 2024
Understanding how wildlife interacts with solar arrays is critical to maintaining healthy ecosystems while deploying clean energy. A team at Argonne National Laboratory set out to develop a camera system that could continuously monitor how birds behave around solar panels using artificial intelligence. Their results provided greater understanding of bird behaviors at large-scale solar sites. Now, they’re testing this system across the country to build a bigger picture of bird interactions with solar systems to support ecologically responsible solar deployment.
Building enough solar energy to decarbonize the U.S. economy by 2035 could require as much as 5.7 million acres of land. While this is only about 0.3% of the contiguous United States, it is critical to understand how solar infrastructure impacts local wildlife so we can develop strategies and technologies that avoid or minimize adverse impacts and maximize benefits.
