Do solar panels attract tornados?

From This Is Not Cool (used to be called Climate Denial Crock of the Week, or ClimateCrocks)

In rural Carrol County, Indiana last week, I happened to listen in briefly on remarks at a County Commission meeting discussing wind and solar energy.
As familiar as I am with the entire range of bogus anti-clean energy talking points, I did hear a new one.

“Solar panels attract tornadoes.”

Kicked that around with some of my companions and everyone agreed that was a new one.

Well, this week I may have stumbled on the source. A good friend, centennial farmer and proud wind turbine host called me and asked me to take a look at a facebook posting about solar energy. He said the author claimed to be some kind of expert, and my friend did not feel well versed enough to respond.
This is what he passed along.

Facebook:

As more & more counties get more solar farms…here’s some truth about solar farms.

From a STEPHENVILLE resident, George Franklin:

I should start by telling you what bonafides I have for writing this. I am a retired aerospace engineer. A literal rocket scientist if you will. I worked on MX (Peacekeeper) Space Shuttle, Hubble, Brilliant Pebbles, PACOSS, Space Station, MMU, B2, the Sultan of Brunei’s half billion dollar private 747 with crystal showers, gold sinks and 100 dollar a yard coiffed silk carpets. I designed a satphone installation on prince Jeffry’s 757. I did all of the design work for the structure of Mark 1V propulsion module currently flying on at least 3 spacecraft that I know of. Some of the more exciting projects I have worked on are not shareable. My personal projects include a spin fishing reel with a 4.5 inch spool which is entirely my own designed, machined and assembled. It has 2 features that are patentable. A unique true flat level wind and a unique line pickup mechanism. I am also am FAA certified glider pilot and FAI certified gold glider pilot. I fly both full scale and model sailplanes. I am Microsoft certified and ComTIA A+ certified.

Solar panels are at best about 20% efficient. They convert almost 0% of the UV light that hits them. None of the visible spectrum and only some of the IR spectrum. At the same time as they are absorbing light they are absorbing heat from the sun. This absorbed heat is radiated into the adjacent atmosphere. It should be obvious what happens next. When air is warmed it rises. Even small differences in ordinary land surfaces are capable of creating powerful forces of weather like thunderstorms and tornadoes. These weather phenomena are initiated and reinforced by land features as they are blown downwind. It is all too obvious to me what will happen with the heat generated by an entire solar farm. Solar farms will become thunderstorm and tornado incubators and magnets.

Solar panels are dark and and they emit energy to the space above them when they are not being radiated. This is known as black-body radiation. Satellites flying in space use this phenomenon to cool internal components. If they didn’t do this they would fry themselves.

So solar farms not only produce more heat in summer than the original land that they were installed on, but they also produce more cooling in winter, thus exacerbating weather extremes.

So I conclude with this. There is nothing green about green energy except the dirty money flowing into corrupt pockets.

There is no such thing as green energy. The science doesn’t exist. The technology doesn’t exist. The engineering doesn’t exist. We are being pushed to save the planet with solutions that are worse than the problems.
———

Well alrighty then. But, as Samuel L. Jackson said, allow me to retort…

Peter Sinclair on Facebook:

This is typical BS produced by another elderly ideologue talking outside his field.

If this logic is correct, every asphalt Walmart parking lot would be creating tornadoes and thunderstorms on a regular basis.

The writer does not explain how solar fields make it “cooler in winter”, which would have to rely on an entirely different physical principle. In fact, solar panels work more efficiently, creating more electricity, in cold weather.

https://www.sunrun.com/…/do-solar-panels-work-in-cold…

Solar panel’s average efficiency of 20 percent makes them, according to research from Dr Paul Mathewson of Clean Wisconsin, an 80 to 150 times more efficient use of land than ethanol.

Gas, coal, and nuclear power plants are enormously inefficient as they emit tremendous amounts of waste energy as heat – requiring vast amounts of cooling water – water that is increasingly in short supply.

Most people don’t know that almost half of the surface water withdrawals in the US are to cool thermal power plants – coal, gas, nuclear.

https://www.usgs.gov/…/thermoelectric-power-water-use

Sun and wind, on the other hand, require little or no precious water.

https://www.iea.org/…/clean-energy-can-help-to-ease-the…

Moreover, as we electrify our energy system, the inherent efficiency of things like EVs will actually allow us to decrease the total primary energy that we use as a planet, as Dr Mark Jacobson (not a “rocket scientist” – an actual Stanford University expert on energy generation) has pointed out.

https://news.stanford.edu/…/50states-renewable-energy…/

Meanwhile, in Texas, energy consultant Doug Lewin points out that solar (and wind) are helping the state ride out the current arctic outbreak. And here in the MISO transmission region, solar and wind are doing a great job helping to keep us lights-on and toasty.

For a self proclaimed “rocket Scientist” – Mr Franklin’s prognostications are stunningly shallow. He should retire to work on his fishing gear.