Italy to put €1.7 billion behind 1GW of agrivoltaics projects

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Reddit
Email
Enel Green Power agrivoltaics plants in other regions. Image: Enel Green Power.

The Italian Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security (MASE) has issued a decree to pave the way to deploy €1.7 billion (US$1.8 billion) towards developing over 1GW of agrivoltaics (agriPV) projects.

The funding was approved by the European Commission last November and is issued predominantly through its Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), which was introduced to aid economic recovery after the COVID-19 pandemic.

This article requires Premium SubscriptionBasic (FREE) Subscription

Try Premium for just $1

  • Full premium access for the first month at only $1
  • Converts to an annual rate after 30 days unless cancelled
  • Cancel anytime during the trial period

Premium Benefits

  • Expert industry analysis and interviews
  • Digital access to PV Tech Power journal
  • Exclusive event discounts

Or get the full Premium subscription right away

Or continue reading this article for free

MASE said that the facility would seek to finance at least 1.04GW of agrivoltaics projects across Italy, sites where solar PV generation and agricultural practice take place on the same piece of land. The planned capacity will be online by 2026.

Of the available capacity covered by the scheme, 300MW is reserved for projects of up to 1MW in size submitted by “agricultural entrepreneurs” and the remaining 740MW for projects of any size.

The RRF funding will cover up to 40% of the eligible investment costs for the planned projects, as well as offering tariffs based on the share of electricity delivered to the grid by the PV arrays.

The Italian government has leant into agrivoltaics before; in August 2022 it launched a €1.5 billion scheme to support the technology, aiming at 375MW of capacity.

Agrivoltaics has numerous benefits for both PV installations and agricultural practices. For the former, it can open up land that may otherwise have been unavailable for solar development and, in some cases, make solar projects more attractive to local communities which may otherwise have opposed them. Modules positioned above plants or crops have also been shown to operate more efficiently due to the cooling effect that evaporating water has on the underside of panels.

For the latter, it can make farmland more profitable and provide extra income for farmers and landowners. Some studies have shown that partial shading and shelter from solar modules can improve growth conditions for some plants. PV Tech Premium spoke with Jennifer Bousellot of the University of Colorado last year about these benefits as an argument for urban or rooftop agrivoltaics.  

The technology is gaining momentum and attention in the industry, particularly in Europe. The EU published research via its Joint Research Centre (JRC) in October 2023 which found that almost 1TW of agrivoltaics capacity would be possible through deployments on just 1% of current EU farmland. Previous independent research had explored agrivoltaics’ potential across the EU, but the JRC report marked the first officially backed acknowledgement of this potential.

25 November 2025
Warsaw, Poland
Large Scale Solar Central and Eastern Europe continues to be the place to leverage a network that has been made over more than 10 years, to build critical partnerships to develop solar projects throughout the region.

Read Next

October 8, 2025
US solar module prices jumped in Q3 2025 as developers scrambled to meet the 2 September 2025 safe harbour deadline for Investment Tax Credit (ITC) qualification, according to supply chain platform Anza.
October 8, 2025
Despite policy headwinds on the federal level, there is optimism for the future of the US solar and storage sector.
Premium
October 8, 2025
PV Talk: Smart Energy Council's Nigel Morris reflects on how Australia has become a global testbed for distributed solar and storage innovation.
October 8, 2025
Officials from Norway and Egypt have agreed provisional terms for the financing of the Dandara solar park in Egypt, which is being built and operated by Norwegian IPP Scatec.
October 8, 2025
Saatvik Green Energy has secured new solar PV module orders worth more than INR7 billion (US$84 million), to be delivered in this financial year.
October 8, 2025
Australia's NEM achieved a new minimum operational demand record of 9,666MW, marking a 4% decrease from the previous record.

Subscribe to Newsletter

Upcoming Events

Solar Media Events
October 21, 2025
New York, USA
Solar Media Events
November 25, 2025
Warsaw, Poland
Solar Media Events
December 2, 2025
Málaga, Spain
Solar Media Events
February 3, 2026
London, UK