The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) is inviting proposals for demonstration projects to co-locate solar and agricultural operations under a $5 million funding round.  

Funding will be available to researchers, solar developers, farmers, non-profit organizations, and local governments that are interested in demonstrating the use of the same land for renewable energy generation and active farming.  

Each project must at least have a 100 kW DC capacity. These are intended to exemplify viable model systems and share data to inform best practices and future project designs, it explains.  

These agrivoltaic or agrisolar projects will need to be located within New York State of the US, said NYSERDA that’s providing the proceeds through its Environmental Research Program.  

Proposals will be accepted to support individual agrivoltaic projects integrating both new or retrofitted solar and farm operations. These could be with cattle grazing, forage, or specialty crop production with up to $750,000 funding available per project.  

“The integration of agriculture operations and clean energy siting is important to understand the costs, benefits and market potential of locating two essential industries in the same space,” said NYSERDA President and CEO Doreen M. Harris. “We look forward to creating new public-private partnerships that can provide economic and agricultural data to demonstrate the feasibility of co-locating solar and farming to inform a future that meets both New York State’s clean energy and land use priorities.” 

Announced on June 7, 2024, the application round will be open till September 12, 2024. The details are available on NYSERDA’s website.