Feldfrüchte und Strom von Agrarflächen: Was ist Agri-Photovoltaik und was kann sie leisten?

Agri-Photovoltaik bedeutet, dass Agrarflächen doppelt genutzt werden: zum Anbau von Feldfrüchten und zur Produktion von Strom. Aufgrund dieser ,,Doppelernte“ verliert die Landwirtschaft keine Anbauflächen ‐ anders als bei Photovoltaik-Freiflächenanlagen, die überwiegend der Stromerzeugung dienen. Damit Subventionen jenen Nutzungen zugute kommen, die der Umwelt und der Nahrungsmittelproduktion gleichermaßen dienen, ist es wichtig, Agri-Photovoltaik von Freiflächenanlagen abzugrenzen und verschiedene Varianten der Agri-Photovoltaik zu unterscheiden.“Agrivoltaics” denotes approaches to use agricultural areas simultaneously to produce food and to generate photovoltaic (PV) electricity. Social impact analysis shows that for a successful agrivoltaics dissemination, clear standards must be set for the agricultural activity on agrivoltaics sites, so that no subsidy abuse and pseudo-farming occur. Until today there is no internationally recognized definition of agrivoltaics, but since more governments are willing to include the technology in their policies, this article derives a generally valid agrivoltaics definition and puts it up for debate. In the first step, differentiation criteria of agrivoltaics from other PV applications were developed. In the second step, the derived properties were scrutinised with reference to the political reasons for agrivoltaics diffusion in Germany, and compared to Germany’s goals in terms of energy and environmental policy. Finally, a basic definition is derived that must meet certain mandatory requirements. This generally applicable definition of agrivoltaics can be supplemented in the national context by optional requirements to steer diffusion more purposefully. The results contribute to the debate on the definition of agrivoltaics in Germany and can also enrich the discourse in other governments and parliaments on agrivoltaics market introduction.