L R AS Published on Sunday 3 December 2017 - n° 214 - Categories:various PVs, R&D
It is possible to cultivate under solar panels.
Fraunhofer ISE proves the feasibility of the Agrophotovoltaics pilot project in Bavaria: agricultural plantations are to be set up underneath two-sided solar panels to provide sunlight to the crops and limit the impact of shading. The glass-glass panels
have been installed at a height of five metres to allow uniform solar radiation. The PV installation was 194 kW and covered one third of a hectare. In twelve months it produced 1,266 kWh/kW installed, a third more than the average value of 950 kWh/kW in Germany. The results of the first harvest were encouraging: the yield of the clover grass under the photovoltaic field was only 5.3% lower than that of the reference plot. Yield losses for potatoes, wheat and celeriac are between 18 and 19% and are therefore slightly higher.
The electricity production of the 194 kilowatt photovoltaic system was well adapted to the daily load of the farm, 40% of the electricity was generated by the photovoltaic system.40% of the electricity produced on the farm was used to charge electric vehicles and to process the crops harvested on the farm. During the summer months, the load demand on the farm was almost entirely covered by the photovoltaic system. Surplus photovoltaic electricity was delivered to an electricity company.
This experience makes it possible to reconcile the farmland with the photovoltaic installations. Fraunhofer ISE believes that further tests need to be carried out to validate this photovoltaic agriculture such as the cultivation of fruit, berries, hops, wine, and to combine them with energy storage.
In China for several years now, cultivation systems have been practiced under dual-purpose, high-yield PV panels.
PV Tech of 24 November 2017
