Guide to Renewable Energy for Landowners

Renewable energy projects are increasing across the United States as a way to generate income and provide clean energy across the power grid. In recent years, many farmers and landowners are considering alternative sources of income and energy generation for their operations. Renewable energy projects have valuable and long-lasting impacts that fit farmers’ and landowners’ needs.

While the idea of beginning a project is appealing, the decision to partner with a developer or start a renewable project on your own farm can be a daunting task. Large amounts of planning and research go into designing these projects to be as efficient as possible. However, there are a lot of differences between a landowner installing a smaller project on their farm to a commercial utility-scale project. While both parties must work within a legal framework, the restrictions on landowners are much more lenient than those imposed on utility-scale projects. Typically for landowner projects, their energy source will connect with an electric meter on their property. For larger utility-scale projects it will run directly into the power grid. 

The following set of tips and suggestions provide a brief guide to starting a landowner or utility-scale renewable energy project. In order to better understand and share the process of installing a renewable energy project, the IN-ACRE team also traveled to three Indiana farms that have successfully implemented renewable energy projects. Read or watch the interviews with the farmers using renewable energy to power their operations below.

Farmer Stories: Written Testimonials

Farmer Stories: Video Interviews

Downloads

By Hannah Latty and Carson Swofford

Special thanks to Indiana Land and Liberty Coalition and Hoosier for Renewables for providing us with valuable information used in this project.