IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v265y2020ics030626192030249x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Implementation of agrophotovoltaics: Techno-economic analysis of the price-performance ratio and its policy implications

Author

Listed:
  • Schindele, Stephan
  • Trommsdorff, Maximilian
  • Schlaak, Albert
  • Obergfell, Tabea
  • Bopp, Georg
  • Reise, Christian
  • Braun, Christian
  • Weselek, Axel
  • Bauerle, Andrea
  • Högy, Petra
  • Goetzberger, Adolf
  • Weber, Eicke

Abstract

Rising demand for solar power generation will lead to increased land use competition, and thus to potential economic and social conflict. A solution to this challenge is to produce food and energy within an agrophotovoltaics (APV) system. Since 2017, governments in Japan, France, Massachusetts (USA), South Korea, and China have introduced policies supporting APV implementation. Governments considering APV implementation – e.g. in India and Germany – for evidence-based policy making are demanding information on how levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) of APV differs from that of conventional ground-mounted photovoltaics (PV), as well as on how additional costs associated with APV installation relate to the benefit of maintaining agricultural activity under APV. Data for a techno-economic price-performance ratio calculation has been retrieved from an inter- and transdisciplinary APV case study in Germany. We observed that the LCOE of APV with €0.0828 kWh−1 is 38% higher than that of ground-mounted PV, resulting in an annual cropland preservation price of €9,052 ha−1 a−1. The annual revenue of potato and winter wheat production under APV resulted in a performance of €10,707 ha−1 a−1 and €1,959 ha−1 a−1 respectively, leading to a beneficial price-performance ratio of 0.85 for potato production and, with a ratio of 4.62, a disadvantageous result for winter wheat. Overall, APV is not necessarily recommended in crop rotating systems. However, in combination with permanent cultures – e.g. berries, fruits, or wine grapes – as the price for these types of applications is lower, while at the same time providing higher performance by optimizing techno-ecological synergies.

Suggested Citation

  • Schindele, Stephan & Trommsdorff, Maximilian & Schlaak, Albert & Obergfell, Tabea & Bopp, Georg & Reise, Christian & Braun, Christian & Weselek, Axel & Bauerle, Andrea & Högy, Petra & Goetzberger, Ado, 2020. "Implementation of agrophotovoltaics: Techno-economic analysis of the price-performance ratio and its policy implications," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 265(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:265:y:2020:i:c:s030626192030249x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2020.114737
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S030626192030249X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.apenergy.2020.114737?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Elamri, Y. & Cheviron, B. & Lopez, J.-M. & Dejean, C. & Belaud, G., 2018. "Water budget and crop modelling for agrivoltaic systems: Application to irrigated lettuces," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 440-453.
    2. Dinesh, Harshavardhan & Pearce, Joshua M., 2016. "The potential of agrivoltaic systems," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 299-308.
    3. Valle, B. & Simonneau, T. & Sourd, F. & Pechier, P. & Hamard, P. & Frisson, T. & Ryckewaert, M. & Christophe, A., 2017. "Increasing the total productivity of a land by combining mobile photovoltaic panels and food crops," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 1495-1507.
    4. Amaducci, Stefano & Yin, Xinyou & Colauzzi, Michele, 2018. "Agrivoltaic systems to optimise land use for electric energy production," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 220(C), pages 545-561.
    5. Cameron Hepburn, 2006. "Regulation by Prices, Quantities, or Both: A Review of Instrument Choice," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 22(2), pages 226-247, Summer.
    6. Xue, Jinlin, 2017. "Photovoltaic agriculture - New opportunity for photovoltaic applications in China," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 1-9.
    7. Dupraz, C. & Marrou, H. & Talbot, G. & Dufour, L. & Nogier, A. & Ferard, Y., 2011. "Combining solar photovoltaic panels and food crops for optimising land use: Towards new agrivoltaic schemes," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 36(10), pages 2725-2732.
    8. Verena Seufert & Navin Ramankutty & Jonathan A. Foley, 2012. "Comparing the yields of organic and conventional agriculture," Nature, Nature, vol. 485(7397), pages 229-232, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chopdar, R.K. & Sengar, N. & Giri, Nimay Chandra & Halliday, D., 2024. "Comprehensive review on agrivoltaics with technical, environmental and societal insights," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 197(C).
    2. Varo-Martínez, M. & Fernández-Ahumada, L.M. & Ramírez-Faz, J.C. & Ruiz-Jiménez, R. & López-Luque, R., 2024. "Methodology for the estimation of cultivable space in photovoltaic installations with dual-axis trackers for their reconversion to agrivoltaic plants," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 361(C).
    3. Mohd Ashraf Zainol Abidin & Muhammad Nasiruddin Mahyuddin & Muhammad Ammirrul Atiqi Mohd Zainuri, 2021. "Solar Photovoltaic Architecture and Agronomic Management in Agrivoltaic System: A Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(14), pages 1-27, July.
    4. Carlos Toledo & Alessandra Scognamiglio, 2021. "Agrivoltaic Systems Design and Assessment: A Critical Review, and a Descriptive Model towards a Sustainable Landscape Vision (Three-Dimensional Agrivoltaic Patterns)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(12), pages 1-38, June.
    5. Joshua M. Pearce, 2022. "Agrivoltaics in Ontario Canada: Promise and Policy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-20, March.
    6. Casares de la Torre, F.J. & Varo, Marta & López-Luque, R. & Ramírez-Faz, J. & Fernández-Ahumada, L.M., 2022. "Design and analysis of a tracking / backtracking strategy for PV plants with horizontal trackers after their conversion to agrivoltaic plants," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 537-550.
    7. Lee, Sangik & Lee, Jong-hyuk & Jeong, Youngjoon & Kim, Dongsu & Seo, Byung-hun & Seo, Ye-jin & Kim, Taejin & Choi, Won, 2023. "Agrivoltaic system designing for sustainability and smart farming: Agronomic aspects and design criteria with safety assessment," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 341(C).
    8. Trommsdorff, Max & Hopf, Michaela & Hörnle, Oliver & Berwind, Matthew & Schindele, Stephan & Wydra, Kerstin, 2023. "Can synergies in agriculture through an integration of solar energy reduce the cost of agrivoltaics? An economic analysis in apple farming," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 350(C).
    9. Fernández-Solas, Álvaro & Fernández-Ocaña, Ana M. & Almonacid, Florencia & Fernández, Eduardo F., 2023. "Potential of agrivoltaics systems into olive groves in the Mediterranean region," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 352(C).
    10. Cuppari, Rosa Isabella & Branscomb, Allan & Graham, Maggie & Negash, Fikeremariam & Smith, Angelique Kidd & Proctor, Kyle & Rupp, David & Tilahun Ayalew, Abiyou & Getaneh Tilaye, Gizaw & Higgins, Chad, 2024. "Agrivoltaics: Synergies and trade-offs in achieving the sustainable development goals at the global and local scale," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 362(C).
    11. Mamun, Mohammad Abdullah Al & Dargusch, Paul & Wadley, David & Zulkarnain, Noor Azwa & Aziz, Ammar Abdul, 2022. "A review of research on agrivoltaic systems," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    12. Alexander V. Klokov & Egor Yu. Loktionov & Yuri V. Loktionov & Vladimir A. Panchenko & Elizaveta S. Sharaborova, 2023. "A Mini-Review of Current Activities and Future Trends in Agrivoltaics," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(7), pages 1-18, March.
    13. Krexner, T. & Bauer, A. & Gronauer, A. & Mikovits, C. & Schmidt, J. & Kral, I., 2024. "Environmental life cycle assessment of a stilted and vertical bifacial crop-based agrivoltaic multi land-use system and comparison with a mono land-use of agricultural land," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 196(C).
    14. Sahoo, Somadutta & Zuidema, Christian & van Stralen, Joost N.P. & Sijm, Jos & Faaij, André, 2022. "Detailed spatial analysis of renewables’ potential and heat: A study of Groningen Province in the northern Netherlands," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 318(C).
    15. Gorjian, Shiva & Bousi, Erion & Özdemir, Özal Emre & Trommsdorff, Max & Kumar, Nallapaneni Manoj & Anand, Abhishek & Kant, Karunesh & Chopra, Shauhrat S., 2022. "Progress and challenges of crop production and electricity generation in agrivoltaic systems using semi-transparent photovoltaic technology," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    16. Agostini, A. & Colauzzi, M. & Amaducci, S., 2021. "Innovative agrivoltaic systems to produce sustainable energy: An economic and environmental assessment," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 281(C).
    17. Rahman, Md Momtazur & Khan, Imran & Field, David Luke & Techato, Kuaanan & Alameh, Kamal, 2022. "Powering agriculture: Present status, future potential, and challenges of renewable energy applications," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 731-749.
    18. Ji, Zhengsen & Li, Wanying & Niu, Dongxiao, 2024. "Optimal investment decision of agrivoltaic coupling energy storage project based on distributed linguistic trust and hybrid evaluation method," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 353(PA).
    19. Edouard, Sylvain & Combes, Didier & Van Iseghem, Mike & Ng Wing Tin, Marion & Escobar-Gutiérrez, Abraham J., 2023. "Increasing land productivity with agriphotovoltaics: Application to an alfalfa field," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 329(C).
    20. Al-Amin, & Shafiullah, G.M. & Ferdous, S.M. & Shoeb, Md & Reza, S.M. Shamim & Elavarasan, Rajvikram Madurai & Rahman, Mohammed Moseeur, 2024. "Agrivoltaics system for sustainable agriculture and green energy in Bangladesh," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 371(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:265:y:2020:i:c:s030626192030249x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.