Why do we keep wasting money on ‘renewable’ technologies that will soon be outdated?
May 25, 2026
By Gary Abernathy
Last week I wrote about the residents of Richland County, Ohio, siding with their county commissioners on banning new large-scale solar and wind projects in much of the county. The wisdom of tapping the brakes on new solar projects is increasingly evident when we consider how rapidly the “renewables” technology is evolving.
In their zeal to force “renewable energy” into every nook and cranny of society, advocates have
been consistently guilty of getting the solar-powered cart ahead of the wind-powered horse. In other
words, time and again we realize, usually too late, that everybody is getting ahead of themselves.
Large-scale solar power is still an emerging technology. Nevertheless, the Obama and Biden administrations threw billions of tax dollars at states and local communities urging – in some cases,
mandating – that they “transition” away from reliable energy sources. As a result, anywhere from
650,000 to nearly one million acres of former farmland are now covered with solar panels, depending on estimates.
American Farmland Trust predicts that as solar installations expand, “the top 12 states will also lose, fragment, or compromise between 306,000 and over 2 million acres of farmland.”
Such a waste. Why? Because even for those who fervently believe in the need to transition to
“renewables,” patience would be rewarded by advances in technology that would allow solar arrays to generate the same amount of energy with a much smaller footprint.
In 2022, citing a study by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National
Laboratory, a Yale School of the Environment article noted that “most estimates of solar energy’s land requirements are outdated, still relying on numbers from the early days of utility-scale operations, when the efficiency was significantly lower, says study coauthor Mark Bolinger.”
The article points out that “arrays that track the sun throughout the day, the dominant technology currently in use, need approximately four acres of panels for every megawatt of power — less than half the land needed a decade ago. That trend, says Bolinger, ‘should continue into the foreseeable future.’”
We can be sure that “the dominant technology currently in use” will itself soon be surpassed by more advanced technology. And yet, solar companies – backed by tax dollars in the form of government subsidies and following outdated estimates of an eventual need for 10 million acres – have snatched up more and more land, even as technology will require fewer acres.
The price of throwing tons of money at a “solution” while the technology is still evolving was driven home by the case of the Ivanpah Solar Power Plant. I wrote last year about the plant, which, I noted, was “built from 2010–14 at a cost of $2.2 billion—including $1.6 billion in three federal loan guarantees from the Obama Energy Department—(but) is now ‘set to close in 2026 after failing to efficiently generate solar energy,’ according to a recent story in the New York Post.”
The plant was already considered outdated because as the technology rapidly evolved, the Ivanpah facility “couldn’t compete with newer and less expensive forms of creating solar power,” the Post reported. I pointed out that “the reckless hurry to ‘go green’ once again ended up with a project deep in the red.”
But here’s a troubling update: Rather than eating the loss and closing the plant as planned last
year, the facility is caught in a costly nowhere land.
“Both the Trump and Biden administrations — along with the utility company that buys its
power — have sought to shut (Ivanpah) down, saying it underperforms, produces expensive electricity and has been overtaken by cheaper energy sources,” Fox News recently reported. “But California regulators have refused to allow it to close, warning that closing the plant could strain the power grid.”
That’s right. The Ivanpah plant presents taxpayers with a no-win situation: Closing it “could leave taxpayers responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars tied to a $1.6 billion federal loan, while keeping it open means higher electricity costs for consumers,” as the report explained. Why?
Because California regulators warn that “shutting down Ivanpah could strand more than $300 million in ratepayer-funded transmission and infrastructure tied to the project, while also creating potential risks for grid reliability — particularly as uncertainty grows around how quickly new energy projects can be built.”
All of which points again to the need for the U.S. to codify legislation that would prevent billions
in tax dollars going down the drain because the government insisted on implementing technology that is years from reaching maturity. The Affordable, Reliable, Clean Energy Security act (ARC-ES) would help ensure that future decisions on America’s energy needs are based on U.S. security, consumer needs and real-world effectiveness – not on shifting political winds.
ARC-ES, introduced in Congress last year by U.S. Rep. Troy Balderson (R-OH) “would require
relevant federal agencies … to review any actions relating to affordable, reliable, or clean energy within 90 days and submit a report to Congress, according to Balderson’s office. “The bill guarantees that our most affordable and reliable energy sources, including nuclear and natural gas, remain part of the energy mix – a crucial requirement to guarantee affordable and reliable energy for American households and businesses.”
If Congress won’t act on ARC-ES, President Trump should enact it through an executive order.
Americans deserve to know that their tax dollars are not wasted on solar-capture technologies that are practically obsolete before the sun comes up.
Gary Abernathy is a longtime newspaper editor, reporter and columnist. He was a contributing
columnist for the Washington Post from 2017-2023 and a frequent guest analyst across numerous media platforms. He is a contributing opinion columnist for The Empowerment Alliance, which advocates for realistic approaches to energy consumption and environmental conservation.