Swedish energy company Vattenfall will invest into its first commercial-scale solar photovoltaic (PV) agriculture park — or ‘agrivoltaic’ park — in Germany, as concerns over food security and land use for renewables developments grows.

The 76-megawatt (MW) Tützpatz project will be located on a 95-hectare plot of farmland in the northern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, where Vattenfall operates as an electric utility. Construction is set to begin in early summer 2023.

Claus Wattendrup, the head of solar and batteries at Vattenfall, tells fDi that despite less than 1% of Europe’s overall land mass being used for solar PV projects there is a “perception” among some authorities that these developments conflict with agriculture.

“There is still this picture in people’s heads that if you build a solar farm then this land is lost for agriculture,” he explains. “Agrivoltaics is offering a way out. If you combine what some people see as two conflicting land uses, and do both, this is very promising.”

Just 0.26% of the EU’s land for only solar photovoltaic projects would be needed to meet the EU’s current total electricity demand, according to SolarPower Europe.

Mixed land use

A variety of models are used by agrivoltaic project developers. Typically, panels are mounted three to five metres above the ground, giving enough space for tractors and other agricultural machinery to get underneath them.

Mr Wattendrup says Vattenfall decided not to use this model as it is very expensive: “I don’t see any economics in that”. Instead, the Tützpatz project will have two-sided panels less than three metres above the ground, which will be mounted on an elevated tracker system that moves and tilts them. Most of the project will be used to raise organic free-range chickens for egg production, with the remainder used for the cultivation of low-growing crops. 

It is important to have the “right partners” for agrivoltaic projects to be successful, Mr Wattendrup notes, as there must be buy-in from both farmers and local authorities. He says that there is generally strong support from farmers as it helps generate additional income.

While solar farms have fairly minimal demands for their operation and maintenance, PV panels in agrivoltaic projects typically need to be cleaned more often than in conventional developments due to debris from crops and livestock. Vattenfall expects there to be a higher maintenance budget for its Tützpatz project than its other developments.

Agrivoltaic projects can be useful in water-scarce regions as there is less evaporation of water on land covered by solar panels. Mr Wattendrup notes that the mixing of solar and agriculture is also well suited to densely populated countries such as the Netherlands, where there is a scarcity of land for solar developments.  

Vattenfall already has a smaller pilot agrivoltaic project called ‘Symbizon’ near Almere, Netherlands, which has an installed capacity of 0.7MW peak. It is expected to be fully commissioned by the end of summer 2023.

Slow permitting challenges

A significant challenge facing solar park developers is the long permitting process, which is often due to slow and understaffed local authorities. Permitting for a utility-scale PV project in Europe can take up to five years, according to SolarPower Europe.

The hope is that alternative models like ‘agrivoltaics’ will help streamline permitting by making solar developments more compatible with communities’ nature conservation, food security and restoration objectives. Around 20 small and medium-sized agrivoltaic projects are currently underway in Germany, according to Vattenfall. All of these projects have less than 10MW of generation capacity. 

While Mr Wattendrup expects the majority of solar farms to be “built more conventionally” on dedicated plots of land in the coming years, he believes that there will be growth in agrivoltaics and that “mixing [of land uses] will happen more and more”.

This article first appeared in the June/July 2023 print edition of fDi Intelligence