Virtual labs for accountability in land use decision making around solar parks

Rationale: The management of land use change for solar parks is increasingly critical and a virtual lab approach would provide a step-change in the understanding of their impacts on the climate and ecological emergencies by supporting an intrinsically open, transparent and integrative approach in support of accountability. Solar parks have the potential to both improve and degrade the hosting ecosystem, but inaccessible data prevents insight. Some companies actively invest in ecological enhancements but their efforts go unvalidated whilst others do nothing, despite industry best practice guidelines.
Aim: To develop a virtual lab that enables analysis of the environmental impacts of solar parks with a focus on design affordances that support accountability of environmental impacts.