Yesterday I watched a video about the commercially available options for installing an electric power generation plant on the balcony of your rented apartment. Commercially available, now.
More seriously, off-shore wind takes up virtually no land, and on-shore wind and PV can share land use with pasture, feed crops and horticultural crops. PV actually improves crop yields in dry regions because of the shading and reduced stress on the plants. So in some places it has a negative footprint. Storage uses no more land than peaker gas, and probably less when pipeline right-of-ways are counted.
It’s about MWh per sq ft. Renewables have terrible energy production density compared with nuclear. Off shore wind isn’t really a thing and the secondary benefits are irrelevant - nothing is stopping you from using a basic shade structure / solar panels if you really want the power anyway.
They have lead, etc. In them. If not properly recycled (they won't be) that'll end up in the environment.
And they cover up and mar the beauty of the land. Maybe that's fine if you live next to a desert.
There are lead backing sheets being used with PV, but they aren't required, and are being phased out in Europe and some other places. The lead is incompatible with some PV new higher efficiency silicon PV technologies due to processing temperature, so there's additional reason to get rid of it. Bifacial PV cells would not have a backing sheet. In any case it is not a requirement for even monofacial PV.
More seriously, off-shore wind takes up virtually no land, and on-shore wind and PV can share land use with pasture, feed crops and horticultural crops. PV actually improves crop yields in dry regions because of the shading and reduced stress on the plants. So in some places it has a negative footprint. Storage uses no more land than peaker gas, and probably less when pipeline right-of-ways are counted.
There really is not a land footprint problem.