Cornell analysis checks photo voltaic panel crop progress in New York
by Krishna Ramanujan, Cornell Chronicle
Ithica NY (SPX) Sep 01, 2025
A sequence 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 necessary info, as rising crops between rows of photo voltaic panels to maximise twin land use will probably be more and more important, particularly since New York’s utility-scale photo voltaic farms cowl roughly 9,300 acres of land.
Within the first of a sequence of research, Cornell researchers examined a 2024 fall crop of radishes and radicchio grown between rows of photo voltaic panels. This 12 months, the workforce of researchers is continuous 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 a particularly robust agricultural legacy, and photo voltaic growth on repurposed agricultural crop lands goes to have to satisfy 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 probably the most environment friendly land use synergies for photo voltaic growth, 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 research, radishes, a root crop, and radicchio, a leafy crop, have been planted throughout the roughly 20 ft of house 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 lowered 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, because of a drop in below-ground manufacturing, because the crops allotted extra useful resource to leaves that gather daylight and trade gases, Sturchio mentioned.
“If progress is delayed considerably in fall crops within the photo voltaic panels, that may imply that perhaps we wish to plant a bit of earlier, and plan to reap later, which could not be unhealthy, as a result of it is going to house out the harvesting,” mentioned Toni DiTommaso, professor within the College of Integrative Plant Science, and co-author of the research.
“We’re attempting to develop a slew of those crops to see which of them have potential, in order that we will present information, science-based info 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, in order that they’re creating minimal shade,” Sturchio mentioned. Growing daylight, even for an additional hour a day, may change the biomass loss that the research discovered, he mentioned.
The work was funded by the New York State Division of Agriculture and Markets as a part of the Cornell Middle for Agrivoltaics.
Analysis Report:Environmental controls of suppressed fall crop productivity in an agrivoltaic solar array
Associated Hyperlinks
