The Plurinannuel de l’Energie (Multiannual Energy Plan), which aims to move away from fossil fuels by 2050 (which currently account for over 50% of our energy consumption), has set a milestone target of 100 GWp of solar power installed in France by 2035 (compared with 18 GWp in the first half of 2023). With the potential for PV on roofs and parking lot shades estimated at between 23 and 53 GWp, it is imperative to expand the potential for agricultural land.
With agrivoltaic technologies enabling the installation of between 0.3 and 1 MWp per hectare, between 29 and 200,000 hectares of agricultural land will need to be equipped to meet our energy targets (i.e. less than 1% of French agricultural land). Agrivoltaics is 140 times more efficient than biofuel and 44 times more efficient than methanization in terms of surface area used.
Since 2014, almost 2,800 agrivoltaic systems have been installed worldwide, representing a total capacity of around 2.9 GWp. Most of these systems have been installed in Asian countries such as Japan, China and South Korea. A few have also been installed in the USA and Europe.
