At first Jennifer Bousselot was furious. Her doctoral thesis on urban rooftop plant cultivation was going to be sullied by the installation of solar panels. The site was the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s downtown Denver office and she had no say.
Then a funny thing happened. It turned out the plants under or next to the solar panels, benefitting from the installation’s shade, had greater total biomass, moisture content and overwintering survivability.
“We ended up with larger plants,” Bousselot said. “It was a happy accident.”
That accident — 15 years ago — set the now 46-year-old Colorado State University assistant professor of horticulture on a career researching rooftops, plants and solar. Along the way Bousselot upped the ante by growing not just any plants but crops.
The goal is to combine the building cooling and heating advantages and stormwater management benefits of a green roof with…
