Bangladesh: Iberia Parish Residents Fear Solar Farms Despite Experts Dismissing Risks

Into a clear blue sky, the sweet-smelling smoke billows and spreads. Farmers have been burning and harvesting sugarcane this way for generations, but the practice creates ash fallout and hazardous air pollutants. Every year, farmers plan and coordinate the fires to clear out pests like snakes and clear leaves, leaving behind only the stalks where the sugar lies.

Nobody in Iberia Parish thinks twice. Sugarcane smoke is a part of life. But locals are wary of the dangers they suspect lurk within a different, newer industry.

This new industry is going to be the ruin of Iberia Parish, they warn, with dangers ranging from toxic smoke and cancer-causing chemicals to homegrown tornados and flying debris, even poisoned farmland and worthless houses. Dangers that are almost entirely imagined, say experts, who now find themselves as the main line of defense against misinformation that could hamstring a vital field. It’s a dynamic being repeated nationwide.

This is a close-knit community, part of the Acadiana region of Louisiana best known as Cajun Country. But last year, opposition to solar farms became so heated here that speakers at Iberia Parish Council meetings were brought to tears.