Cornell analysis assessments photo voltaic panel crop progress in New York
by Krishna Ramanujan, Cornell Chronicle
Ithica NY (SPX) Sep 01, 2025
A collection of research by Cornell researchers is testing how crops may develop when planted between rows of photo voltaic panels on a photo voltaic farm in New York state.
By buying actual information, researchers might be able to present farmers and policymakers with vital data, as rising crops between rows of photo voltaic panels to maximise twin land use shall be more and more crucial, particularly since New York’s utility-scale photo voltaic farms cowl roughly 9,300 acres of land.
Within the first of a collection of research, Cornell researchers examined a 2024 fall crop of radishes and radicchio grown between rows of photo voltaic panels. This yr, the group of researchers is constant experiments by planting strawberries, raspberries, winter wheat, soybeans, zucchini, peppers, chard and dry beans, beginning within the spring, with promising early outcomes.
“New York has an especially robust agricultural legacy, and photo voltaic improvement on repurposed agricultural crop lands goes to have to fulfill farmers the place they’re at,” mentioned Matt Sturchio, a postdoctoral affiliate. “We want to have the ability to discover options that both co-locate or discover essentially the most environment friendly land use synergies for photo voltaic improvement, in order that’s why we’re doing this work.”
Whereas crops are being grown efficiently on photo voltaic farms within the Southwest and Midwest, New York is challenged by a brief rising season and restricted daylight, and shade from photo voltaic panels.
Within the present examine, radishes, a root crop, and radicchio, a leafy crop, had been planted throughout the roughly 20 ft of area that lies between rows of photo voltaic panels on a photo voltaic farm close to Albany. The researchers discovered reductions in daylight created by early morning and late afternoon shade stunted the autumn crops, particularly the radishes.
Not solely was daylight decreased within the check crops, however so was leaf temperature, which collectively led to decrease carbon accumulation, or biomass. The change in biomass was particularly pronounced within the radishes, as a result of a drop in below-ground manufacturing, because the vegetation allotted extra useful resource to leaves that acquire daylight and alternate gases, Sturchio mentioned.
“If progress is delayed considerably in fall crops within the photo voltaic panels, which may imply that perhaps we need to plant just a little earlier, and plan to reap later, which could not be unhealthy, as a result of it can area out the harvesting,” mentioned Toni DiTommaso, professor within the College of Integrative Plant Science, and co-author of the examine.
“We’re making an attempt to develop a slew of those crops to see which of them have potential, in order that we are able to present information, science-based data to policymakers and to farmers who could also be considering of getting concerned,” DiTommaso mentioned.
In Europe, photo voltaic farm operators are beginning to orient panels, so they’re parallel with the solar’s rays, as a substitute of perpendicular. “As an alternative of catching the entire solar’s rays, they permit mild to move via, so that they’re creating minimal shade,” Sturchio mentioned. Growing daylight, even for an additional hour a day, might change the biomass loss that the examine discovered, he mentioned.
The work was funded by the New York State Division of Agriculture and Markets as a part of the Cornell Heart for Agrivoltaics.
Analysis Report:Environmental controls of suppressed fall crop productivity in an agrivoltaic solar array
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