The dream of agrivoltaics is to generate your electricity and eat your edamame too. But a recent study in Agroforestry Systems shows that agrivoltaics — growing food beneath solar panels — is not so simple. Research published in September finds that overall crop yields decrease when paired with solar panels and offers a way to standardize agrivoltaic regulations so we don’t give too much valuable agricultural land over to power generation. “Electricians want more panels, farmers want less,” study author Christian Dupraz, senior scientist in agroforestry and agrivoltaism at the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE), writes in an email to Mongabay. “[The analysis] reveals that maintaining a ‘normal’ agricultural yield under PV [photovoltaic] panels is not possible, even with low GCRs [ground coverage ratios].” However, planting crops under partial shade isn’t a new idea — and can work under some conditions. Traditionally, agricultural and agroforestry systems used multilayered plantings by, for example, cultivating shade-tolerant crops such as coffee under bananas. Now, with growing demand for clean energy but a paucity of empty land, researchers are exploring how to grow crops under raised solar panels (photovoltaics) instead of trees. The idea is that the solar panels are arranged so crops still get enough light and may also benefit from protection from extreme weather such as heavy rain, frost or heat. To accomplish this, the solar panels can be arranged above or between crop rows, or in moveable systems that allow more sunlight through at certain times of…This article was originally published on Mongabay
The post We need a better understanding of how crops fare under solar panels, study shows appeared first on EnviroLink Network.