Volume 23: Sustainable Energy Solutions for a Post-COVID Recovery towards a Better Future: Part VI

On the Advent of Solar Concentrating Photovoltaic Modules in Crop Cultivation Environments Shiva Gorjian, Farid Jalili Jamshidian, Pietro Elia Campana

Abstract

Energy is a crucial component of the agri-food sector since almost 30% of the world’s energy is consumed by this sector. Under such circumstances, the employment of renewable energies can be a sustainable solution to mitigate the adverse environmental impacts as consequences of the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the agri-food supply chain. Generation of electricity using photovoltaic (PV) technology to supply the power demand of the agriculture and food production sectors requires large areas of land. To solve this problem, the co-generation of solar PV electricity and crop production (agrivoltaic concept) is expected to relieve this restriction. An emerging agrivoltaic technology is the installation of concentrating PV (CPV) systems in crop cultivation environments to both provide the power demand and produce food on the same land. This study presents an overview of agrivoltaic systems and CPV technology with a special focus on the advent of CPV modules in agricultural environments. In this case, the main benefits and challenges of this technology are presented and discussed.

Keywords Sustainable agriculture, Crop production, Solar concentrators, Agrivoltaics