PV Mounting Systems for Agricultural Land

The Core Design Challenge

In a conventional ground-mounted solar farm, the primary structural objective is to maximise energy yield at minimum cost. In an agrivoltaic installation, the structure must also preserve conditions for agricultural use — which means maintaining machinery access, avoiding excessive soil compaction from foundations, minimising shading where it is not wanted, and in some configurations, providing shade where crops benefit from it.

These dual objectives push agrivoltaic structures toward higher clearance heights and wider inter-row spacing than a conventional solar farm of equivalent capacity would use. This typically increases structural costs per unit of installed power.

Elevated Fixed-Tilt Systems

The most common agrivoltaic structure in Italian installations is an elevated fixed-tilt system. Panels are mounted on steel posts at heights ranging from 2.1 metres to 5 metres above ground, depending on the farming activity below and the requirements of the specific authorisation.

Post foundations

Two foundation approaches are used for elevated systems. Driven piles — steel posts driven directly into the soil — minimise surface disruption and can be removed at end of life without leaving significant soil disturbance. Concrete foundations provide higher structural stability in poor-soil conditions but remove more soil from agricultural use and are harder to remediate at decommissioning.

Italian agrivoltaic project authorisations increasingly specify driven-pile foundations as the preferred approach, particularly on productive agricultural soils, to allow post-project land restoration.

Inter-row spacing

The Italian GSE/CREA guidelines require a minimum of 70% land availability, which constrains how densely rows can be placed. In practice, inter-row spacing in Italian installations ranges from 6 to 12 metres, depending on the crop type and the machinery in use. Wider spacing reduces energy density but allows larger machinery and leaves more land with full solar exposure.

Single-Axis Tracking Systems

Single-axis trackers — structures that rotate the panel array from east to west following the sun's daily arc — offer higher annual energy yield than fixed-tilt systems. In an agrivoltaic context, tracking also offers a secondary benefit: it allows the shading pattern beneath the panels to be managed dynamically.

During the cooler parts of the day, panels can be angled to increase exposure to the crops below. During the hottest midday hours, panels can be tilted to provide more shade, potentially reducing water stress in heat-sensitive crops. This dynamic shading capability is a research focus at several Italian agricultural research institutions.

Structural considerations for tracking

Tracker systems require more complex mechanical components than fixed structures and carry higher maintenance requirements. The tracker drive and control systems add cost and potential failure points. In fields subject to significant wind loading — a factor in coastal areas and in the hill country of central and southern Italy — tracker designs must account for wind-induced vibration and the loads generated when arrays are driven to a stow position during high winds.

Bifacial Panels

Bifacial photovoltaic modules — which generate power from light received on both front and rear surfaces — are used in some elevated agrivoltaic installations. The rear surface captures reflected and diffuse light from the ground below. On agricultural land, where the ground surface varies between bare soil, mulch, and crop canopy, the rear-side gain from bifacial modules is generally lower than on reflective desert or white-ballast installations.

The main argument for bifacial panels in an agrivoltaic context is that the elevated mounting height, which is imposed by agricultural requirements, creates exactly the conditions in which rear-side irradiance is meaningful. The additional cost of bifacial modules over monofacial at comparable power ratings has narrowed in recent years.

Vertical Bifacial Systems

A distinct configuration — vertical bifacial installations, sometimes described as "agri-PV East-West" — uses panels mounted vertically in rows oriented roughly north-south, so that one face receives morning sun and the other afternoon sun. This configuration produces a more even daily generation profile than a conventional south-facing system and creates two distinct shading patterns on either side of each row rather than a broad shaded zone beneath panels.

Vertical bifacial systems have been tested with cereal crops in central European conditions. Their use in Italy is limited, with most documented installations in northern regions. The configuration is best suited to open croplands where machinery can operate between rows and where the crop does not require the concentrated midday shade that a horizontal elevated system can provide.

Structural Loading and Terrain

Agrivoltaic structures on Italian farmland must meet the load requirements of Italian standard NTC 2018 (Norme Tecniche per le Costruzioni), which governs wind, snow, and seismic loads. Italy has significant seismic activity in several agricultural regions, including Emilia-Romagna, Calabria, Sicilia, and the Apennine belt. Structures in seismic zones require specific design input and, in some cases, additional site investigation.

Configuration	Typical clearance	Machinery access	Main use cases
Elevated fixed-tilt	2.1–5 m	Standard farm machinery	Vegetables, vineyards, soft fruit
Single-axis tracker	2.5–6 m	Standard to wide machinery	Cereals, vegetables, fodder crops
Vertical bifacial	n/a (vertical)	Between rows	Cereals, pasture

Decommissioning Requirements

Agrivoltaic authorisations in Italy typically include a decommissioning plan. The plan must set out how the structure will be removed at end of life and how the land will be restored to agricultural use. Driven-pile foundations are required to be extracted rather than cut at ground level. Concrete foundations require excavation and removal. Authorisation conditions often require a financial security deposit to cover decommissioning costs.

The typical operating life assumed in Italian authorisation documents is 25–30 years, aligned with panel warranty periods. End-of-life recycling requirements for solar panels are covered by Decree 49/2014, which transposed the EU WEEE Directive for photovoltaic modules.