Photovoltaics meets agriculture: Agri-PV systems in the focus of the 3rd SolarTAP Industry
Photovoltaics meets agriculture: Agri-PV systems in the focus of the 3rd SolarTAP Industry
Düren/Jülich, April 10 - 11, 2024 - Within the Solar TAP innovation platform (short for "Solar Technology Acceleration Platform for emerging Photovoltaics"), industry and science work hand in hand to rapidly develop new photovoltaic technologies to market maturity. The third industry day focused on the integration of photovoltaics in agriculture, also known as Agri-PV. This ground-breaking technology promises to revolutionize the efficiency of agriculture and at the same time pave the way for sustainable energy.
Agri-PV: How the production of solar power and plants can succeed side by side
Demonstration plant in the Rhenish mining area: New technologies are being tested here, such as setting up the solar modules vertically or mounting them on a movable axis to follow the path of the sun.Copyright: Ralf-Uwe Limbach
Lightweight, flexible and customizable: Printed innovative photovoltaic technologies (so-called "emerging photovoltaics") offer more than just the generation of sustainable energy. One example of an application with multiple benefits is agri-photovoltaics (agri-PV for short), which offers enormous potential for Germany's energy transition. Prof. Ulrich Schurr, Director of the Institute of Plant Sciences at Forschungszentrum Jülich (IBG-2), highlighted the global status in his keynote speech and thus set the focus of the "3rd Solar TAP Industry Day". Dr. Matthias Meier-Grüll (IBG-2) added an overview of the Agri-PV demonstration projects at Forschungszentrum Jülich.
Excursion to Agri-PV demonstration plants
The Industry Day was preceded by an excursion to various Agri-PV demonstration plants at Forschungszentrum Jülich. Here, the participants were able to see for themselves that the production of electricity and plants on agricultural land can complement each other:
Flexible use of photovoltaics in agriculture through integration into existing foil tunnels.Copyright: Karen Forberich/HI ERN
In the Agri Food-Energy-Park (AgriFEe) innovation laboratory, the area-efficient use of agrivoltaics/hortivoltaics is being investigated under the specific conditions of the Rhenish mining area. A demonstration plant on around two hectares of land shows how high-quality berry bushes and medicinal and aromatic plants thrive under around a thousand solar modules. A visit to a raspberry plantation also provided an opportunity to discuss the integration of photovoltaics with existing foil tunnels. Such adaptations show how flexibly solar elements can be used in modern agriculture to meet the challenges of climate change and contribute to the energy transition.
Together with RWE, Forschungszentrum Jülich operates a further demonstration plant in the Rhineland mining area, which in particular enables the testing of new technologies, such as setting up the solar modules vertically or mounting them on a movable axis in order to follow the path of the sun.
From research to application
Technology transfer is a key objective of the innovation platform. Four existing transfer projects were presented. Dr. Karen Forberich, HI ERN, gave an update on the status of the development of the stage-gate process with which the Helmholtz centers are optimizing the internal development processes for printed solar modules.
Dr. Hans-Joachim Egelhaaf, HI ERN, provided a look behind the scenes of research: he played a key role in the development of an organic PV module (OPV for short). This achieved a new certified record efficiency of 14.46 percent. The researchers were thus able to prove that organic photovoltaics can be established as an alternative to silicon & co. in the long term.
Prof. Ulrich Lemmer from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) explained how inkjet processes can be used for the development of optical structures using the example of the collaboration with the start-up Prio Optics as part of Solar TAP.
Strong partners and a growing network
The innovation platform is already working with 90 strong partners from industry and the network continues to grow. Six new companies from Germany and abroad presented themselves in Jülich:
Cleantech Innovation Park (Germany, network provider and research platform)
GM Functionals (Denmark, machine manufacturer)
Green Meteor (Netherlands, manufacturer of irrigation systems)
Mitsubishi International (Japan, manufacturer of chemicals)
Novavert (Germany, manufacturer of shading systems)
Rowo Coating (Germany, manufacturer of vacuum coatings on film).
In several workshops, experts from the fields of material suppliers, device manufacturers, producers and users continued to work together on the Solar TAP Roadmap and the market overview for printed photovoltaic technologies. Together, implementation milestones were refined and critical properties defined.
In the innovation platform Solar TAP (short for "Solar Technology Acceleration Platform for emerging Photovoltaics"), the technologies for these new multi-benefit PV applications are to be developed together with industry partners. The Forschungszentrum Jülich, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin and the Karlsruhe Institut für Technologie want to make the results fast and easily accessible to industry, society and end users via the platform.
Under the coordination of the Helmholtz Institute Erlangen-Nuremberg for Renewable Energy (HI ERN), a branch of Forschungszentrum Jülich, the three research facilities form a closed value chain in which world-leading laboratories and experts of the Helmholtz Association participate.
Solar TAP is one of three new innovation platforms funded by the Helmholtz Association with a total of 40 million euros from the Pact for Research and Innovation. The aim is to create new structures and opportunities for technology transfer and the joint use of large-scale equipment, research infrastructures and data.
The funding for the Solar TAP innovation platform amounts to 15.1 million euros for the 3-year set-up phase which is funded starting in March 2023. In close cooperation with strong partners from industry and society, the platform will strengthen transfer and innovation in the Helmholtz Association and initiate long-term applied solutions.
