More farms generating renewable energy, report finds
By Sara Wyant, AgriPulse.
WASHINGTON, Nov. 3, 2016 - From 2007 to 2012, the number of farms generating revenue from on-farm renewable energy more than doubled to nearly 58,000 - or 2.7 percent of U.S. farms. That's according to a recent report from USDA's Economic Research Service (ERS), “Trends in U.S. Agriculture's Consumption and Production of Energy: Renewable Power, Shale Energy, and Cellulosic Biomass.”
Farmers and ranchers are also profiting by leasing mineral rights and wind rights. ERS did not include the roughly 16,600 farms that leased wind rights to others or that produced ethanol and biodiesel on the farm in its total.