Justice-driven agrivoltaics: Facilitating agrivoltaics embedded in energy justice

Taylor, M., Pettit, J., Sekiyama, T., & Sokołowski, M. M. (2023). “Justice-driven agrivoltaics: Facilitating agrivoltaics embedded in energy justice.” Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews 188, 113815. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2023.113815

Highlights

• Agrivoltaics refers to co-location of solar energy on agricultural land.
• Agrivoltaics will benefit from the application of energy justice.
• Three key functions applicable to agrivoltaics are analysed.
• Justice-driven framework can activate the full potential of agrivoltaics.

Abstract

Agrivoltaics comprises solar energy generation and agricultural activities co-located to create multi-purpose agricultural solar energy systems. In 2021, the global agrivoltaics sector was valued at USD $3.6 billion and is projected to grow to USD $9.3 billion by 2031. Agrivoltaics projects have successfully attracted increasing investment and research demonstrating the technical, economic, and scientific rationale to advance agrivoltaics as a crucial technology to achieve net zero emissions goals. The legal framework enabling agrivoltaics development is at varying stages of maturity across different jurisdictions. This study provides the first socio-legal study of agrivoltaics development applying an energy justice framework. It comparatively analyses the mature agrivoltaics sectors, laws, and policies in Massachusetts (United States of America) and Japan in a functional comparative analysis with New South Wales (Australia) applying the three principal pillars of energy justice; recognition, procedural, and distributive justice. This study demonstrates how energy justice can generate a framework for regulatory reform. Such reform can facilitate the expansion of agrivoltaics and unlock the full potential of co-locating of solar energy and agriculture.