Bill McKibben Author, educator, and environmental activist; a founder of 350.org and Third Act.

“In America, we have 30 million acres of corn that we grow for ethanol, gasoline. That produces 3% of America's energy. That same 30 million acres, if you covered them with solar panels, would produce about 100% of the energy that America uses.”

The Energy Gang · Climate & Energy · October 2026

McKibben, interviewed at Climate Week NYC, answering a question about pushback on putting solar panels on farmland. He says the world needs only one or two percent of its land for energy, and that clean electrons are as important a crop as corn.

The Energy Gang · 2026-10-13 Listen to the episode → More from Bill McKibben → More Climate & Energy quotes →

Transcript

The Energy Gang Around 1:11:13 into the episode

Speaker 3

…by this time next year, there are going to be people saying it's time to effectively globalize those factories, run them 24-7, and pile solar panels on every wharf and railroad siding on planet Earth so that people can do what Pakistanis did and by themselves rejigger their country's energy system.

Ed Crooks

…seems to be, at the same time as people like you are saying we need to deploy solar power as rapidly as possible for climate reasons. There is also pushback from people saying, well, we shouldn't be putting panels all over good farmland. There's, you know, NIMBYism is out there. There's some of

Speaker 3

that, but I think it's, I think, that we're doing our best to make sure that it subsides. So, for instance, at Third Act, we've trained up dozens and dozens of what we call solar advocates, older people who show up at community meetings and public hearings to provide information where misinformation is too rife. And it's not that hard. The land use thing is a good example. We need one or 2% of the land surface of the earth to produce our energy. That's not ridiculous. I mean, in America, we have 30 million acres of corn that we grow for ethanol, gasoline. That produces 3% of America's energy. That same 30 million acres, if you covered them with solar panels, would produce about 100% of the energy that America uses. We don't want to cover all of Iowa with solar panels. We got lots of roofs. But if there's some farmland that needs to be used, then clean electrons are an important crop, as important as corn, you know, maybe more since we mostly use it to just grow more beef, you know.

Ed Crooks

So, in terms of what you've been seeing at Climate Week and the conversations you've been having, how optimistic would you say you are now about progress of climate action?

Speaker 3

Climate Week doesn't send, you know, chills up and down my spine. I mean, a lot of what is here are people who've been sort of dutifully working away at this for a long time on behalf of their company, whatever. But that's not how we make change on a big scale. That's what movements do. We have the…

Ed Crooks

Bill McKibben, thank you very much. Finally, I spoke to Helen Clarkson. She's the chief executive of the climate group, which organizes Climate Week. And I asked her for her reflections on the event.

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