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A survey by Dutch researchers compared the visual impact of aerial and vertical agrivoltaic farms on nearby residents and found that vertical arrays appear less invasive.
Researchers from Wageningen University and Research in the Netherlands assessed the landscape quality perceived by people living next to an agrivoltaic (AV) system implemented with an aerial configuration and a vertical agrivoltaic array.
Their survey was conducted through a series of interviews with people who live next to or pass by two agrivoltaic farms with two different configurations located in the Dutch province of Gelderland.
“The link between landscape impacts and support for renewable energy projects highlights the importance of examining the social acceptance of agrivoltaics from a landscape quality perspective,” the researchers emphasized. “In this research, landscape quality (LQ) is considered from a subjective school of thought, examining individual experiences of two landscapes, including the meanings attributed by users of the landscape.”
The aerial system considered in the study is located in Wadenoijen and was built in March 2021 on a 3.7 hectare plot of land. Before the installation of the AV system, the land was used as a gooseberry farm and the fruit is still grown under the panels.
The vertical AV, on the other hand, is located in Culemborg, in a pasture area. It began operating in August 2022 on an area of ??0.7 hectares and, in addition to pastures, also houses a small field with herbs and plants, a beehive, as well as trees and bushes.
The survey was conducted with a total of 62 respondents, 32 living near the vertical farm in Culemborg and 30 near the aerial system in Wadenoijen. It included 24 questions, all related to use, experiential, and future values. “Use value refers to functional suitability and efficiency, experiential value relates to identity and meaning, and future value considers efficiency and sustainability over time,” the academics explained.
Use value was represented in the survey by questions relating to the factors of accessibility, multifunctionality, farmer participation, environmental impacts, and recreational and community activities. Experiential value was represented, on the other hand, by factors of attractiveness, health and well-being, wildlife habitats and visual appearance, while future value refers to stability/flexibility and cultural and landscape development.
“The results reveal that respondents preferred vertical interspatial AVs over aerial AVs,” the scientists stated. “Use value increased for vertical interspace AVs (12%), but decreased for aerial AVs (-11%). The experiential value was reduced in both cases (-11% for interspatial AV and -16% for aerial AV). Future value increased slightly for both AV systems (2%).”
In the vertical farm case, the visual appearance experience was reduced by 3% after the plant was built, a minor change compared to 24% in the top case. The heard plant also reduced the perceived positive effect on wildlife by 60%, while the vertical AV changed it by 48%. The quality experience in health and well-being fell by 28% in the vertical case and 33% in the aerial plant.
The results also showed that in the case of vertical panels 90% of residents believed that involving farmers in the energy transition is a good thing, while in the general panels the rate was 80%. In the case of aerial AVs, the environmental impact factor was the most important in the decrease in use value with a reduction of 147%, compared to the negative 8% in the vertical case.
When asked to rank the factors most important to them, environmental impact came first at 13%, followed by health and wellbeing at 12% and wildlife habitats at 12% as well. Recreational and community activities, attractiveness, and accessibility got the fewest responses, at 7%, 6%, and 5%, respectively.
“While agrivoltaics represents a potential solution to the land allocation challenges of solar energy infrastructure, the experiential value of landscapes, as evidenced in this research, deserves more attention,” the academics concluded. “Although this study examined two particular types of AVs in the Netherlands, the findings also provide directions for agrivoltaic developments elsewhere.”
The survey was presented in the article “ Landscape user experiences of interspace and overhead agrivoltaics: A comparative analysis of two novel types of solar landscapes in the Netherlands ” of solar landscapes in the Netherlands), which was recently published in Energy Research & Social Science . |
