German renewable energy company RWE’s agrivoltaics (Agri-PV) plant has now started supplying green electricity into the German grid after a construction period of just five months.
The new demonstration plant was built on about seven hectares of recultivated land at the edge of the Garzweiler opencast mine, in North Rhine-Westphalia, the company said in a statement.
RWE said that important application research will be carried out at this site to show how solar power generation and agriculture can go hand in hand.
The demonstration plant has a peak capacity of 3.2 megawatts and consists of three technical Agri-PV concepts, which allow for both agricultural and horticultural use of the land.
RWE said that the solar modules are fixed and mounted vertically on the supporting structure. Within the second concept, the modules are mounted on a movable axis which allows them to follow the course of the sun from east to west.
“This is designed to maximise the yield of the photovoltaic system,” the company said in a statement.
Under these modules, plants such as alfafa, beans and raspberries are to be cultivated, RWE added.
They explained further that over the years, the interplay between plant growth and photovoltaic technology will be monitored under a variety of seasonal weather conditions.
