Narromine farmer Andrew Gill has installed 400 solar panels, replacing his diesel engine, to run his irrigation bore.
It is a movement that has the backing of traditionally conservative farming organisations.
In the middle of a dusty paddock, surrounded by dirt and scrub, Mr Gill looks down a hole.
"That's 102 metres deep, which is where we draw our water from," he said.
He is referring to a bore — one of the sources of water on his family farm, south of Narromine in the central west of New South Wales.
With his brothers and parents he runs livestock, winter crops and in the summer, cotton.
It is an expensive business.
Cotton needs a huge amount of water and at the moment, Mr Gill draws it up using a large diesel engine that once came from a truck.
"We've got a very big diesel bill. Depending on the seasons, we buy into the hundreds of thousands of litres a year," he said.
That means hundreds of thousands of dollars.
So after years of intensive research, he has decided to try something new: A 400-panel, 100-kilowatt solar plant to run the pump.
"I don't consider there's any risk in it, if we can decrease the cost of one of our greatest inputs, it's going to be a win-win," he said.
Mr Gill said his mini solar farm would cost more than $200,000, but he was confident he would make the money back.
"The main reason we're looking for an alternative is the cost," he said.
"There are other benefits, obviously there's a big one with carbon, you know we won't have as much pollution.
"There are a lot of other people looking to do things in agriculture and in the cotton industry especially to try and reduce the amount of pollution and carbon.
"And if this is a small way of doing that on our farm, it's definitely a win."
Mr Gill is one of the farmers who has been advised by Gerry Flores, the Energy Innovation manager, with the rural lobby group, New South Wales Farmers.
Mr Flores said it makes sense that farmers were breaking the stereotype of people who embrace solar and other renewable energy sources.
"Renewable energy and the conservative mindset of being more independent as well, I think that matches," Mr Flores said.
"What's been a bit of an issue is that a lot of the development in this, it's been attached to a political agenda.
"So some people might look at renewable energy and identify at it as a green policy, or identify it as a political statement.
"But we're not about that, we want to look at the financial case of an energy system that's going into the property and present to the farmers that way and just look at it from the basis of financials."
Renewable technology 'no longer a niche market'
Mr Flores said renewables were no longer a niche and referred to the 4.5 gigawatts of solar panels which are installed on the rooftops of Australian homes.
"People are aware that this can save them money," he said.
"But it's also, I think, a mentality for farmers, they want to be independent, they want to be able to say 'well this is the energy that I produce'.
"So there's that mentality and the capacity to do that in farms that isn't available in a lot of metropolitan areas."
Mr Gill sees renewable electricity as a fundamental part in the future of Australian farming.
"From a cost point of view, it's definitely the future, oil isn't going to get any cheaper as supplies dwindle," he said.
"If we want to continue doing what we're doing, we have to become more environmentally aware and anything that we can do to increase that bottom line is a win."
Source - http://www.abc.net.au
