- Engie Green, a unit of French energy giant Engie, has been operating a vertical agrivoltaic demonstrator for the past two years on the site of the National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRAE) in Laqueuille, Puy-de-Dôme department, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in the center of France.
The choice of this photovoltaic technology was made because of its production profile, with the solar power plant producing over an extended period from 5 a.m. to 8 p.m. due to the vertical deployment of the panels.
The first results have shown that by 2024, the energy produced by the 100 kW pilot, called Camélia, had exceeded the production of a ground-based plant of the same power by 30%.
In addition Engie also unveiled agronomic data showing that the plant has entered its second year of agronomic monitoring and its first year of solar energy production.
Initial observations show that the presence of solar panels modifies the microclimate of the meadow. Over several months, the researchers measured a halving of wind speed without any major change in wind direction. Over the course of a day, the solar installations temporarily modify the light and thermal conditions on either side of the panels. “However, since all the microclimatic data has not yet been analyzed, we will have to wait another cycle to draw relevant conclusions,” the company explained.
Concerning the production of plant biomass, if this is not modified by the distance to the panels or the east-west orientation, the meadow of the 18-meter inter-row is more productive than that of the 12-meter inter-row. Several explanations are put forward by INRAE: the intrinsic spatial variability of the plot, the presence of a little more grass, and potentially a little more light in 18 meters than in 12 meters.
Finally, all the animals present on the Camélia plot were equipped with sensors to measure activities such as ingestion, rumination, rest, and standing, as well as their position in the shade or light and their spatial position via GPS. During the first grazing cycle in May, in wet and cool conditions, the scientists observed that the animals spent about 1/3 of their time in the inter-rows of the panels and 2/3 of their time around the panels.
In warmer and slightly drier conditions, during the second grazing cycle in June-July, the animals spent a little more time in the shade of the trees located on the plot. In addition, the presence of the panels does not seem to modify their activity because the activity profiles were similar to those on the Camélia plot and another plot used during the inter-grazing. Once again, these initial observations made on the cattle should be further explored with a more complete data set on the other grazing cycles studied
Author: Gwénaëlle Deboutte
This article was originally published in pv magazine and is republished with permission.
