A recent Harvard study concludes cutting down trees to build solar farms in order to fight climate change doesn’t work.

“Since 2010, over 5,000 acres of natural and working lands have been destroyed for solar development in Massachusetts, resulting in the emission of over half a million metric tons of CO₂— more than the annual emissions of 100,000 passenger cars,” Mass Audobon stated in a summary of its study with Harvard Forest.

“Under current siting practices, thousands of acres of forests, farms, and other carbon-rich landscapes are being converted to host large-scale solar,” the report stated.

The removal of trees undercuts the state’s requirement to reduce emissions by 2050. This is because trees are an effective carbon removal tool. “By 2030, climate-polluting emissions in Massachusetts must be reduced by 50 percent relative to 1990 levels, and by 75 percent by 2040, on the way to net-zero emissions by 2050,” the study stated.

“Because it is not feasible to eliminate fossil fuel use across the entire economy by 2050, reaching our net-zero goal will also require removing carbon from the atmosphere, to counteract our remaining [greenhouse gas] emissions,” the study stated.

Like most New England states, Massachusetts is overcast most times and it defies logic to set up solar panel farms that would be better suited for sunnier states like Florida, Arizona, or Nevada. Worst of all, manufacturing solar panels results in lots of pollution too. Michael Shellenberger states “solar panels require 17 times more materials in the form of cement, glass, concrete, and steel than do nuclear plants, and create over 200 times more waste,” such as “dust from toxic heavy metals including lead, cadmium, and chromium.” 

Sweden was able to successfully decarbonize their power grid, ended their use of renewables and (like France) expanded their use of nuclear power while simultaneously replacing most of their fossil fuel power plants. Unlike wind and solar farms, nuclear plants don’t kill birds or even people and hardly emit any carbon pollution. Yale University scientist Dr. Steven Novella says nuclear power is the safest form of energy available when considering deaths per megawatt of energy produced.

A recent study supports the contention that nuclear power is best for the environment. Then again, the bad effects of renewables (such as their killing humans) is probably why environmentalists support them in the first place.