Agrivoltaic Farming – Plant Architecture

Introduction to Agrivoltaic farming

Agrivoltaic farming is the practice of growing crops underneath solar panels. It uses the shaded space left empty under solar panels to grow crop. This is doubling up the land use in this way it could help feed the world’s growing population while providing sustainable energy. According to recent studies, there are shade loving plants which thrive when grown in such environment.

Agrivoltaic farming already in use

Researchers in South Korea have been growing broccoli underneath photovoltaic panels. The panels are positioned 2-3 meters off the ground and sit at an angle of 30 degree providing shade and offering crop protection from the weather.

A study in this project found that the quality of broccoli was not any lower than that of broccoli grown in traditional way.

An Agrivoltaic farming project in Kenya is using solar panels held several meters off the ground, with gap in between them. The shade from the panels protects vegetables from heat stress and water loss.This has resulted in rural farmers being able to grow a greater range of higher-value crops. The project effectively harvests the power of sun twice, the researchers say.

If solar panels can be added to greenhouses, the results could be especially transformative. Greenhouse-based farming reportedly produces 10 times more food than growing in an open field, but it can require 10 times as much power.

14/10/24

This project was alloted to Akash, his internship is about to finish in few days, so I have to continue this project further. This project is on Agrivoltaic farming and under this project we are firstly focusing on plant architecture section. There are some plants such as marigold, okra, chilli, tomato, brinjal, cucumber, chrysanthemum, which are planted in an open field to measure the plant parameters till their full growth. Weekly measurements of plant parameters and daily observation of plants were in process. This measurements were taken to develop a computerized tree generation on HELIOS Software for further comparative study.