Solar Urban Garden

The Horta Solar (Solar Urban Garden) is a multidisciplinary research and demonstration project of an agrovoltaic system to explore the combined and synergistic production of solar electricity and agricultural products.

The configuration of the garden was designed to explore the effect of shading solar panels on the productivity and irrigation needs of crops planted in the underlying zone. The study of these synergies is one of the main focuses of the research, and several advantages have already been registered:

• for plants: contrary to what one might think, plants may benefit from the shading of the panels, especially in summer, as this will reduce heat stress and irrigation needs;

• for the panels: in the presence of plants, less dust is deposited on the panels, allowing a better functioning; the panels become more efficient when the temperature is lower, a situation favored by evapotranspiration of plants; Although they constituted a more expensive system, the bifacial panels (the case of these), produce more because they are further from the ground and receive more solar radiation.

The agrovoltaic system is installed in the outdoor solar energy laboratory on the campus of the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and is an initiative developed within the scope of the Sustainability Living Lab.

The project will evaluate the potential of the combined approach of photovoltaic generation and agricultural production.

The planting of the Solar Garden took place on the college campus on 21 March 2023, the International Day of Forests, as part of Sustainability Week, an event organized by students from CIÊNCIAS.

For more details about the project, read the article in Renewables Magazine 53 (2023) 32-33.

References about the project:

• Produção renovável 2024: Portugal atingiu o valor mais alto de sempre. Faculdade de Ciências criou horta há 2 anos. (IN) Ivo Costa, Miguel Brito, Pedro Pereira, RTP report

• Horta solar em Lisboa testa sistema agrovoltaico em cidade, Construir​

• Projeto da FCUL e da Image4All traz painéis solares para horta urbana para gerar energia​

• Redação AWAY

• https://say-u.pt/image4all-desenvolve-projeto-agrovoltaico-em-horta-urbana-da-fcul/

• Artigo na Renováveis Magazine 53

• Postgraduate dissertation - 2022, Manita, João Luís Ventura, Desenvolvimento de um Sistema Agrofotovoltaico

• Soluções ‘agrivoltaicas’ para um futuro sustentável | Construir

• Postgraduate dissertation - 2024 - Convié, Jobim Lopes, Synergizing Agrivoltaics, Agroforestry, and IoT for Sustainable Agriculture. Design and Implementation of a Field Experiment in Urban Environment

Project coordinators: Miguel Centeno Brito

Project members: David Avelar, Florian Ulm, Ivo Costa, Jobim Convié, Pedro Pereira, João Manita, António Vedes, António Pato, João Serra, Guilherme Gaspar, Diogo Vicente

For more information, please contact  sustentabilidade@ciencias.ulisboa.pt.