Comparative analysis of PV configurations for agrivoltaic systems in Europe

Agrivoltaics (APV) is the dual use of land by combining agricultural crop production and photovoltaic (PV) systems. In this work, we have analyzed three different APV configurations: static with optimal tilt, vertically-mounted bifacial, and single-axis horizontal tracking. A model is developed to calculate the shadowing losses on the PV panels along with the reduced solar irradiation reaching the area under them for different PV capacity densities. First, we investigate the trade-offs using a location in Denmark as a case study and second, we extrapolate the analysis to the rest of Europe. We find that the vertical and single-axis tracking produce more uniform irradiance on the ground, and a capacity density of around 30 W/m2 is suitable for APV systems. Based on our model and a 100 m-resolution land cover database, we calculate the potential for APV in every NUTS-2 region within the European Union (EU). The potential for APV is enormous as the electricity generated by APV systems could produce 28 times the current electricity demand in Europe. Overall, the potential capacity for APV in Europe is 51 TW, which would result in an electricity yield of 71500 TWh/year.