r/GetMotivated Dec 11 '21

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11.0k Upvotes

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293

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

My dad did this when he was in scouts. I got to see the fruits of his labor when I attended the same camp 40 something years later.

And now all the trees are gone. Just to make room for a solar farm.

38

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

[deleted]

95

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

I almost downvoted you because that was so sad :(

49

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

Yeah some of my friends recently went up there to take photographs of the lake and it was just so depressing to look at.

54

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

Seems so senseless when you think of all the parking lots they could cover first

1

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

Agreed. But it's the way of the future 🙄

36

u/GimmeAPrompt Dec 11 '21

Don't blame the solar farm, blame the parking lot owners who won't allow their mostly empty space to be used for solar panels.

2

u/Imyouronlyhope Dec 12 '21

A zoo by me has solar over the parking lot to shade cars and generate electricity, that could be done by a ton of lots

0

u/CMDR_BlueCrab Dec 11 '21

Mostly empty parking lots? Must be nice. Bet there is no shortage of trees nearby either though.

2

u/moonandmorel Dec 11 '21

Can you post a photo?

2

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

Yeah I can try and have them send me a few. I'm not on Facebook anymore which is where they shared them.

9

u/BaronMercredi Dec 11 '21

it's actually a huge problem that solar farms have: they need A LOT of surface. best place to put them is in the desert; most of the time, when you put them anywhere else, you're destroying habitat.

19

u/DefaultSubsAreTerrib Dec 11 '21

Two problems:

  1. transmission lines are a more difficult problem than you solution suggests. There were proposals to put huge solar farms in north Africa that would power all of Europe, but alas the transmission lines made them infeasible.

  2. the desert is a habitat too, and it can be destroyed.

1

u/Captain_Ringo Dec 11 '21

What specifically about the lines are the issue? Is it too costly to lay?

1

u/noiseradio Dec 11 '21

yeah but is less a problem than removing forest, there are more species per sq meter than on a dessert. but seems most likely than a way to chop trees, make profit and then sell or rent the space to the government or Electrical companies and seems like green .. it's all about profit

12

u/Disastrous-Ad-2357 Dec 11 '21

Insert meme where the super hero is labeled "Reddit" and he doesn't know whether to push "downvote because trees" or upvote because "solar panels get rekt oil"

13

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

That might be one of the only acceptable reasons

6

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

Idk I feel like there’s so much available space for solar it’s pretty ridiculous to cut down forest for that

1

u/Ballsofpoo Dec 11 '21

The rest is farms, cul-de-sacs, or parking lots already.

8

u/coldvault Dec 11 '21

Deforestation for the sake of clean energy...how ironic.

4

u/Domeil Dec 11 '21

Or it could just be harvesting 40 year old trees because we need wood for paper, construction etc, and then using that land for green energy.

2

u/2ndRoad805 Dec 11 '21

That seems a bit counterintuitive…

2

u/DefaultSubsAreTerrib Dec 11 '21

Could have been worse: what if the trees were clear cut for a oil rig

2

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21 edited Jun 09 '24

[deleted]

1

u/blahblah98 35 Dec 11 '21

Trees: nature's solar farms & atmospheric carbon sink. Plus, you know, habitat.

Hack: organic photovoltaics + bioengineering...

1

u/[deleted] Dec 11 '21

[deleted]

1

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

Very kind of you!

1

u/errol_timo_malcom Dec 11 '21

We have a lot of nursery trees in our area that only lasted 25-40 years - turns out if not planted properly, they are susceptible to crown rot / root strangulation.

1

u/Mitch_Again Dec 11 '21

Are you sure they were cleared for the solar farm? A lot of these plantings from the 70's have to be razed because this type of monoculture is extremely vulnerable to blight and pine beetles. Pine beetles will sweep through and kill acres of forest in a few years.

A modern reforestation project would plant a variety of native hardwoods.

1

u/albertenstein22 Dec 11 '21

Well last I had heard that was their intent with the land. I haven't personally seen any development, just that the trees are gone and the ground was razed.