Solar Soil: Ground-mounted Solar and Soil Related Ecosystem Services

Project Overview and Goals

2025 Internship Focused on Solar Energy Facilities on Tribal Lands

Soil Sampling Using TSIP method (Source: Lee Walston, Argonne National Laboratory)

The developers and operators of ground-mounted solar energy facilities, the communities in which they are sited, landowners, conservation organizations, and regulators have a strong interest in designing and operating solar sites that maximize soil health and ecosystem services provided by soil. Little work, however, has been done to consistently quantify soil-related ecosystem services at solar facilities.

The goals of the Solar Soil project include:

Establishing best practices and methods for quantifying soil constituents (including carbon, pesticides, and select nutrients and metals) at ground-mounted solar energy facilities;
Contributing to a publicly available national database on soil organic carbon (SOC); and
Investigating SOC cycling and soil-based carbon storage potential for solar facilities.

This is a 3-year project funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office.

News

Pollinator habitat established at a solar facility in Minnesota. This study would work to better understand how these solar development designs influence soil carbon sequestration and other soil-related ecosystem services. (Image by Argonne National Laboratory.)

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