Agrivoltaics

Wind turbines and solar panels in fields

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Our vision is to revolutionize food and power supply, through research, innovation and demonstrators that accelerate the exploitation, commercialisation and marketisation of agrivoltaics: co-locating crops or grazing with ground-, building- or glasshouse-integrated photovoltaic (PV) arrays. Solar PV’s flexibility enables integrated food and power systems that reduce carbon emissions, avert land and water shortages, produce food, improve energy security and protect biodiversity while making agriculture more sustainable and profitable in light of upcoming subsidy changes.

However, inadequate experience, understanding, and models of successful deployment within the UK and across other nations is preventing stakeholders and investors from progressing agrivoltaic deployments. Stimulating agrivoltaic development through demonstration stands to benefit the UK economy through regional agriculture and energy production, and through the concentration of skills, innovations, know-how and markets that can equip the UK for global leadership.

Alona Armstrong

Theme lead

Professor Alona Armstrong

Professor in Energy and Environmental Studies

I am currently a Natural Environment Research Council Industrial Innovation Fellow and a Senior Lecturer in Energy & Environmental Sciences. I am in the Plant, Soil and Land Systems research group within and a core member of , leading the Agrovoltaics and Energy Decarbonisation themes.

My research focuses on the implications of the low-carbon energy transition on the local environment, including ecosystem function, properties and service provision. I use a range of desk, field, laboratory and modelling approaches to resolve understanding, taking a positive approach – we need to decarbonise energy supplies and there will be more land taken for renewable energy infrastructure but how can we do this whilst maximising environmental co-benefits? Working collaboratively with stakeholders from across sectors is central to my work. I look to use the understanding developed to inform policy and practice, with the underpinning aim of promoting the delivery of environmental benefits, beyond that of low-carbon energy, from the energy transition. Previous to my energy research, I focused on the response of peatland carbon cycling to land management perturbations.