Canada is a leading global agricultural exporter, and roughly half of Canada’s farmland is in Saskatchewan. New agrivoltaics research shows increased biomass for a wide range of crops. This study looks at the potential increase in crop yield and livestock in Saskatchewan through agrivoltaics along with its financial implications. Then, the legislation that could influence the adoption of agrivoltaics in Saskatchewan is reviewed. Specifically, experimental results from agrivoltaic wheat production are analyzed for different adoption scenarios. The impact of converting the province’s pasture grass areas to agrivoltaics and using sheep to harvest them is also examined. The results indicate that approximately 0.4 million more tons of wheat, 2.9 to 3.5 million more tons of forage and 3.9 to 4.6 million additional sheep can be grazed using agrivoltaics in Saskatchewan. Only these two agrivoltaics applications, i.e., wheat farmland and pastureland, result in potential additional billions of dollars in annual provincial agricultural revenue. The Municipalities Act and the Planning and Development Act were found to have the most impact on agrivoltaics in the province as official community plans and zoning bylaws can impede diffusion. Agrivoltaics can be integrated into legislation to avoid delays in the adoption of the technology so that the province reaps all of the benefits.
See also[edit | edit source]
- Coal with Carbon Capture and Sequestration is not as Land Use Efficient as Solar Photovoltaic Technology for Climate Neutral Electricity Production
- Dual use of land for PV farms and agriculture literature review
- sheep
- Israeli white plastic reflectors
- A Farmer's Guide to Going Solar (NREL)
- German guidelines: https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/content/dam/ise/en/documents/publications/studies/APV-Guideline.pdf
- 2021 review
- Miskin, C.K., Li, Y., Perna, A., Ellis, R.G., Grubbs, E.K., Bermel, P. and Agrawal, R., 2019. Sustainable co-production of food and solar power to relax land-use constraints. Nature Sustainability, 2(10), pp.972-980.
- Retrofitting solar parks for agrivoltaics
- Shading PV
- Alexis' talk at American Solar Grazing Association2021