Renewable energy and community

How exhilarating to read of the pilot solar farm at ISU (“Crops and solar intersect as Iowa’s first agrivoltaics project prepares to power up,” Brittney J. Miller, The Gazette, Oct. 20). Agrivoltaics is a win-win all the way around, for renewable energy, farmers, communities, pollinators, and locally grown fruits and vegetables.

We can only hope this will lead to a replication of community solar arrays in many places in our state and nation. It’s the kind of multifaceted solution that is needed to transform to a regenerative energy grid, while demonstrating the power of regenerative and community-based agriculture.

Also invigorating is the news this week of the solar hub at Wellington Heights Community Church (“Church unveils solar panels;” Brittney J. Miller, Oct. 31). This second local resiliency hub will power a faith community, help a neighborhood rebound from the 2020 derecho., and provide shelter in the next natural emergency. This is a brilliant partnership between the church, the community, Kirkwood, and several energy businesses.

Not to mention the incremental impacts these projects will have in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Let us hope and pray that projects like these will continue to spring up across Iowa and the world. The cost of solar energy production is one-tenth of what it was in the year 2000. If our production of solar power can begin to catch up with and grow alongside wind power (now 1% solar vs. 58% wind power in our state,) we can reach 100% renewable energy.

The technologies of solar, wind, and regenerative farming, must be coupled with the peoplepower that these projects will increase. Climate change is ultimately a human problem. It will take families, neighbors, faith communities, educational institutions, businesses, and governments pulling together to create multiple ways of living lightly on the earth. We will all profit from cleaner air, water, soil, and a more temperate climate.

In his 2015 Encyclical, Laudato Si (Praise be), On Care for Our Common Home, Pope Francis remarks “how inseparable the bond is between concern for nature, justice for the poor, commitment to society, and interior peace.” These local projects carry out that inseparable bond between care for the earth and its people, by addressing human, societal, and energy transformation.

Jay Gilchrist is a retired pastoral minister living in Iowa City.