6,000 sheep will soon be grazing on 10,000 acres of Texas solar fields

Oh boy this comments section is wholesome and uplifting! :)

I was just trying to share a story I found positive, and made me feel good. I had no idea grazing sheep was such a controversial topic 😃

I guess I'll have to scrutinize any future post I contribute
- Not your fault, after the sheep disaster of 2003, people are very mixed on their existence.
  
  But for real, you couldn't do anything about what the comment section became.

Sheep lawnmower go brrrrrrr

*baaaaaaaaaaa

where's the article op

The website reduces its carbon footprint by not connecting to the internet or even turning on the web server

Good Lord apparently Lemmy hates sheep. What is with his comment section? Just miserable sheep haters.

Wake up sheeple

I like it, but wouldn't goats be better?

I'll admit I'm not sure of the pros/cons of either. All I know about sheep/goats is that sheep produce wool, and goats produce milk...and I'm pretty sure the only reason I know that, is due to one of the many city builders I've played 😂

couldn't they just let it be wild lands instead?

Solar fields and random trees growing out of the ground do not mix well...

Sheep aren't zero maintaince at all though.

That's true, but they are more efficient and cost effective than running gas powered mowers around solar panels. The added bonus of not needing to purchase feed during parts of the year is also a nice plus
- Is it not also a great way to achieve harmony with life on earth and our technological advancements? Seems pretty cool that we can farm energy, while providing space and shade for other life as well.
  
  Fuckin’ cool.
So? Op didn’t say they were and it isn’t even relevant anyway
- I'm in favor but I'm just not sure that sheep maintenance will be any less trouble and expense than mower maintenance. Mowers don't get contagious diseases, break out of their fences and get on the highway, or have trouble giving birth at 3:00 a.m.
You can sell their wool for profit. So you gain profit from the sheep, profit from the solar panels, and save money on mowing.

You've completely missed the point.
- I think meat is the only way to make money from sheep. That and the fact they make more sheep.
  
  The wool is mostly inconvenient unless you're a third world farmer. Clarkson's Farm found it cost £1.50 per sheep to have them shaved, but the wool was only worth about £1.20.

What exactly is uplifting about animal agriculture?

The largest solar grazing project in the U.S. will reduce mowing costs and emissions — and make for some happy sheep.
- Will it make for happy sheep? Unless they have the veterinarian capacity to take proper care of these 6,000 sheep then they are simply being exploited rather then protected.
exactly. we should have all our animal agriculture be seperate in more factory style conditions. These sheep should be penned and fed off feed like normal.
You can have sheep without solar or sheep with solar. Not having sheep isn't an option on the table.

Either be happy about the solar or don't comment.
- Actually no sheep is absolutely an option.
  
  But Lamb is delicious and wool is a renewable natural fibre that doesnt shed microplastics... so yeah sheep and green energy please.
They'd all be dead without it.
- I bet a lot of the animals in animal agriculture wish they were dead. This isn't a good argument imo

I doubt they took into account the emissions and other climate effects due to the animal agriculture they will be supporting.

What deference would it make if they did?

Moving sheep from on pasture land to another doesn’t change the emissions from these sheep.

The question is what happened to the land these sheep use to be on.
When I saw your post, I initially dismissed it entirely and thinking how embarrassing it was for you to take a story that does produce a positive net benefit for climate and try to turn it negative from a completely unrelated view. Obviously I assumed from your statements that your opposition was due to you being vegan. A 5 second view of your post history confirms this. I want to give you the benefit of the doubt and understand where you're coming from and what you want to accomplish. It got me thinking about what your thought process was when you posted here on this story. I have some questions about your motives and methods I wouldn't normally ask, but you're putting yourself in the spotlight for your cause so you might be open to a discussion. If so my questions are:

You clearly support veganism, and I assume you would want others to adopt it too. Did you think your delivery here here would make omnivores suddenly abandon their diets and adopt yours? Did you consider that your message (while containing some accuracy) would actually turn people off from veganism because they didn't want to be associated with people that do what you did here and crap all over otherwise good news?

How did you decide to just inject your veganism into this story? What criteria did this one meet that you thought "this one, this one needs to have passive aggressive veganism representation"? Was it just random that you saw this one and weighed in with veganism or do you spend lots of time scouring for all stories that don't have an unrelated vegan view and then you inject one? It makes me wonder how effective that is for your movement. Or is this more of a act of martyrdom? Are you "fighting the good fight" whenever and where ever it can be?

If your overall goal is reducing livestock agriculture have you considered your highly negative approach actually working against your goal? Alternatively, are you intentionally cultivating the negative stereotype against vegans for some reason I don't understand? If so, can you explain so I can gain understanding?
- Different vegan here. I'll be blunt about it: There's facts about animal agriculture, which are uncomfortable, if you're not vegan.
  Actually being ignorant about them rarely happens as a conscious decision, it's more a matter of it just not making for a great smalltalk topic when you're not vegan.
  I'm not saying this from some smug position either, as I was non-vegan at some point, too (like the vast majority of vegans), and I know how much shit I didn't know back then.
  
  Animal agriculture organizations will also gladly add to the confusion, by talking only about CO2 emissions, when they should be talking about CO2-equivalents.
  
  This post has too little info to really know what's going on, but it happens that people think grazing animals are 100% climate-neutral, so it mentioning lots of grazing animals and a reduction in emissions also had me wondering, if that is actually true.
  
  If some of these sheep would not have otherwise been raised, then it's possible that mowing the fields with a CO2-exhausting mower would be less bad for the climate. Of course, electric mowers would be even better.
I think the sheep predate the panels
- For a second I thought you said that the sheep are predators of the solar panels
oh I'm sure they actually did. if there's one thing Republicans are good at, it's being contrarian assholes about all climate related policy. I'm sure someone tried to poke every hole they could in this.

but you'd have to have a pretty warped understanding of emissions to think that mowing a field with sheep is even close to a lawnmower. this field needs to be mowed to keep the solar panels clear. even if these sheep weren't eaten or used for any other purpose, this would still be a good policy. as is though, we will also be getting wool, because these sheep will die without being sheered. we will likely be getting other products too. I'm not sure if they will be eaten, but probably not. they aren't very popular for meat here.

sheep are legitimately a very green way to mow a field when you consider alternatives. like, i guess they could use those hand push manual mowers or scythes or something, but that would mean hiring thousands of people. that may be ultimately the best thing for everyone but the billionaires that profit on it, but let's bee realistic here. that's not happening.
Ok vegan which is it?

Renewable energy or fossil fuels?

Natural fibres or man made petrochemical based polyester constantly shedding microplastics?

Ethically raised ree range grass fed protein or factory farms?
- Ethically raised ree range grass fed protein
  
  How do you ethically raise a being with the intent to kill them and then send them off to a violent death?