Agrivoltaics combine photovoltaics with agricultural production on the same land, but operators currently lack AV specific O&M strategies and digital tools; practices are mostly adapted from conventional PV and do not adequately consider farming operations, microclimates or agriculture related stressors such as dust, vibrations, soiling and corrosion.
PowerAV brings together partners from Norway, Denmark, Germany and Türkiye to tackle this gap.
The project maps technical, environmental, organisational and socio-cultural O&M challenges through media analysis and stakeholder interviews in five or more European countries. In parallel, it deploys an advanced sensor package, including smart PV modules with integrated temperature, humidity, vibration and soiling sensors, in three AV demonstrators spanning subarctic, temperate and Mediterranean climates, complemented by conventional PV reference plants.
These data feed into hybrid physical/data driven models that quantify how AV specific stressors affect degradation, yield and lifetime, and into machine learning-based forecasting and predictive maintenance frameworks. Building on this, the project develops and tests agrivoltaic-optimised tracker control algorithms that harmonise PV generation with crop growth, soil moisture, access for machinery and structural stress limits, and scales the most promising concepts to a MW scale power plant.
By reducing AV O&M costs, improving system lifetime and reliability, and easing cooperation between energy and agriculture stakeholders, PowerAV supports wider, more sustainable deployment of agrivoltaics and contributes to European climate and energy goals.