Yeah, the technology connections video on this was fantastic. If one was to cover that land in solar, you’d produce far more than the current energy demands of the US.

Relying on an energy source which requires constant, continuous resource extraction is fucking stupid when we can spend resources up front and get reliable energy (solar + battery) for decades with minimal operating cost & maintenance. And then we’ll have a recycling loop to minimize future resource extraction.

If you want to debate that, spend some time with this video first: https://youtu.be/KtQ9nt2ZeGM

What does the 1% of land used to grow corn have to do specifically with solar and batteries? Solar doesn't need to be on the 15% arable land at all.

The corn doesn't just produce ethanol, which just utilizes the starch/sugar. The protein, fat, fiber is eaten by livestock in some form like distillers grains.

And governments like to have food security , and having secondary uses for an abundance of food in the good times is more convenient than storing cheese in caves , and in case of an emergency shortage the production is already there without having to rip up solar panels to grow food.

My conclusion is you're conflating issues (solar and ethanol) unnecessarily.

I’d rather people went rooftop solar, and put that land to producing food.

Correct me if I’m wrong but my understanding was that ethanol in gasoline was a result laws enacted due to corn farmers (or their state reps) lobbying for subsidies, not any intrinsic part of gasoline production

Damn I didn't know it was that bad. Ideally you'd grow algae from sewer waste and make fuel from that, but this is the US we're talking about.