Renewable Energy in the Water, Energy and Food Nexus aims to bridge this gap, providing the broad
analysis that has been lacking on the interactions of renewables within those key sectors. Building on existing
literature, the study examines both global and country-specific cases to highlight how renewable energy
can address the trade-offs, helping to address the world’s pressing water, energy and food challenges. Land uses for energy and food production are closely related, and can be made compatible.

The production of bioenergy feedstock, in particular energy crops, may require arable land, thereby raising the risk of competition for land resources. This conflict can be addressed by improving land-use efficiency by increasing yields, setting the right incentive frameworks, promoting integrated food–energy systems assessing the use of abandoned or degraded land suitable for certain bioenergy crops, and using non-competing agricultural waste streams and residues as feedstock. Energy production technologies have varying land intensities and affect the quality of land differently.

It is therefore important to consider both quantitative (e.g., installed capacity per square metre) and qualitative aspects (e.g., duration of impact, changes to quality of land), across the entire life cycle – fuel extraction and processing, installation, production and decommissioning. With technology advancements and efficiency improvements, the land intensity of different power generation technologies reduces, thereby presenting opportunities for repowering existing plants, deploying more capacity with less land.

The Global Atlas for Renewable Energy, for example, is a free online resource assessment tool to help policy makers and investors appreciate the extent of the renewable energy potential at their disposal in any given area.The new tool REsource offers the best available data and information on renewable energy which is now freely accessible. It enables users to easily find country-specific data, create customized charts and graphs, and compare countries on metrics like renewable energy use and deployment. It also provides information on renewable energy market statistics, potentials, policies, finance, costs, benefits, innovations, education and other topics.