CMS Expert Guide to Agrivoltaics and Floating Photovoltaics in The United Kingdom

At the moment there are no regulations specifically targeting agrivoltaics in the UK, with no formal definition of “agrivoltaics” adopted by UK legislation, and no indication from the government that there may be any agrivoltaics-specific regulation in the near future. The laws and regulations applicable to the development and operation of solar photovoltaic projects therefore apply to agrivoltaic projects, including any applicable environmental and/or planning laws.

However, the concept has at least been discussed by Parliament, including in the House of Commons in April 2024, when it was noted that through the use of agrivoltaics the UK’s energy security can be improved without sacrificing the UK’s food security. This highlights the importance of ensuring that any policy or regulation that is implemented in respect of agrivoltaics is carefully weighed against the UK’s need for food production and security.

Despite the lack of a formal legislative framework, as of April 2025 there are 15 commercial operational agrivoltaics projects in the UK. Most of these projects are relatively small (i.e. generating between 1MW and 5MW) and mainly involve beekeeping and sheep grazing (as opposed to growing crops).

The largest operational project in the UK, with a generating capacity of 30.1MW, is the Bracks Agrivoltaics Project developed by BayWa in Cambridgeshire. This project has allowed local farmers to graze sheep at the site since 2024, with further plans for hedgerow planting and the installation of bat, bird and owl boxes also forming part of the project’s design. There are also reports of a 1GW solar farm in Nottinghamshire, where up to 9,000 sheep can graze, which was in early stages of development last year.

Whilst there are no regulatory hurdles specifically affecting the implementation of agrivoltaics in the UK, the process for implementing such projects in the UK is already heavily regulated, with various processes that must be cleared (including obtaining grid connection and planning consent).

Obtaining planning permission to construct and operate these projects involves a number of steps and can be time-consuming, including numerous environmental checks to be completed and reports submitted.

The ongoing grid connection reforms seek to alleviate the congested queue for grid connections and will shape what must be done to secure a grid connection date – see the latest Law Now on TMO4++ for more information. This reform is crucial as it can make connection process more efficient and facilitate project development. However, not all hurdles relevant to solar projects apply the same to agrivoltaics projects: whereas the planning approval process for solar farms can be contentious due to concerns about the loss of high-quality agricultural land and potential impacts on food production, such concerns are less relevant to agrivoltaic projects, which can deliver renewable energy while supporting farming.

Furthermore, there are additional financial hurdles facing developers of agrivoltaics as opposed to more conventional solar PV projects. This is due to the higher installation costs of PVs suspended above the ground compared to their ground-mounted counterparts, as well as potentially greater exposure to landowners for crop loss liabilities.

Given the scale of UK land dedicated to farming, there appears to be great potential for agrivoltaics projects in the UK, with researchers from the University of Sheffield suggesting that agrivoltaics could meet the country’s electricity demand fourfold without sacrificing farmland.

Regions such as Cambridgeshire, Essex, Lincolnshire, and the broader East and Southeast of England are considered to be highly suitable for the deployment of agrivoltaics due to factors such as flat land, existing agricultural use, grid connectivity, and levels of solar exposure. Simulations for crop-based agrivoltaics by the University of Exeter showed that agrivoltaics systems allow land to become more profitable per unit area compared to standalone PV or crop systems, with an average increase in annual operating profit of 210% across all locations studied. The potential for an increase in land efficiency from agrivoltaics was highest in the southern half of the UK, in regions such as Kent and Dover.

Studies have also been carried out to understand how crops growing underneath solar PV panels are affected in the UK, with reports being mixed, noting that for certain crops (such as potatoes and cabbages) yields were unaffected or even increased, whereas for certain other crops (such as strawberries) crops yields decreased. Therefore, in order to accurately understand the potential of agrivoltaics in the UK, more research needs to be carried out to determine how crops are affected when grown under solar PVs, and therefore how much of the UK’s farming land could be used for agrivoltaics without having an adverse impact on food production.

There is a relatively small support scheme currently available: the Rural Development Programme for England offers grants of between £15,000 and £100,000 for farmers, horticulturists and land managers to build solar panels on their land, with an application deadline of 31 July 2025.

Beyond this, there are currently no other specific financial support programmes in the United Kingdom dedicated exclusively to agrivoltaics and there is no indication from the government that there may be such programme in the near future. However, the UK government offers various schemes, such as Contract for Different (CfD) scheme (which is the UK’s primary tool for supporting low-carbon electricity generation, protecting renewables projects from price volatility by guaranteeing a fixed price for the electricity produced) which could be awarded to agrivoltaics projects, although CfDs are typically granted for large projects, and so a feed-in-tariff or similar may work better for small scale agrivoltaics projects.

Private investment has also not been particularly high in the sector, which may be due to the lack of clarity surrounding whether there will be any restrictions on the use of agrivoltaics (given the importance of food production in the UK) and the additional costs of agrivoltaics compared to more conventional solar PV.

There are no regulations specifically targeting FPV projects in the UK, and there is also no indication from the government that there may be any FPV-specific regulation in the future (although the laws and regulations applicable to the development and operation of solar PV projects in general would apply to FPV projects). Additionally, further environmental regulations may apply in relation to the installation and operation of solar panels on water, such as the permitting regime for activities that may pose a flooding risk and habitats regulations if any marine life may be affected by the project.

Proposals for regulation have been put forward by third party groups, including calls for standardisation by the BSI Group. This proposal referred to the enormous potential for deployment of floating PVs in the UK and therefore the need to ensure that there are quality and safety regulations that would apply across the UK, made even more important given reports of issues with the development and operation of floating PV projects from countries where these projects are more established.

Despite the considerable potential for its deployment, the UK FPV sector is still very much in its infancy (particularly compared to other countries). The UK’s largest operational FPV project has a capacity of 6.3MW (the project in London’s Queen Elizabeth II Reservoir, which was the largest floating solar farm in Europe when it became operational in 2016). There are a number of much smaller projects, including UK’s first operational floating solar farm, based in Berkshire and operational since 2014, which has a capacity of 200KW.

There is ongoing activity in the industry, with Associated British Ports having submitted a planning application for the 40MW “Barrow EnergyDock” floating PV project (Cumbria) in March 2025, which would be (by some margin) the UK’s largest FPV project. There are also reports of Green Cat Renewables making enquiries about a potential 40MW project at Cavendish Dock (Scotland), and of Nova Innovation and RSK joining forces with their “AquaGen365” joint venture, established for the purpose of rolling out FPV in the UK. 

Energy projects in the UK must go through an ever-evolving approval process before they can even begin to be constructed (especially for large scale projects). There are various processes that must be cleared (including obtaining grid connection and planning consent) representing both time consuming and costly processes.

Even just obtaining planning permission to construct and operate these projects involves a number of steps, which can include producing a thorough “environmental impact assessment” report, showing compliance with government guidelines, and a lengthy public enquiry process (at which it must be demonstrated, under challenge to the contrary, that the country’s need for the project outweighs the cumulative negative impact it would have). Furthermore, these processes and their requirements will vary significantly according to which part of the UK the project is intended to be located in, and its size. The processes can be very expensive, and time consuming (with planning permission alone potentially taking years to obtain).

The ongoing grid connection reform seeks to alleviate the congested queue for grid connections and will shape what must be done to secure a grid connection date – see the latest Law Now on TMO4++ for more information. This reform is crucial as it can make connection process more efficient and facilitate project development.

The UK’s potential for delivering power generated by FPV is huge, with a number of lakes within the UK being deemed suitable for hosting FPV projects. Researchers from Lancaster University and Bangor University have estimated that if just 10% of the surface of those lakes were used for FPV, the amount of electricity generated from that alone could be as high as 2.7TWh per annum, which is just under 1% of overall electricity demand based on Ofgem’s estimates.

Additionally, much like how solar PVs can be installed on land used for farming without needing to stop farming (i.e. agrivoltaics), solar PVs can also be used on water sources used for other purposes, including hydropower. There are 570 reservoirs located within the UK – if FPV projects were set up on even just a small percentage of these reservoirs, the energy generation boost could be significant. Furthermore, if FPV projects are set up at those reservoirs which also contain operational hydropower projects, they could benefit from the power transmission infrastructure already set up at those locations, significantly reducing costs to developers, and speeding up the deployment of FPV projects.

To date there has been a relative lack of investment in the UK “floatovoltaics” market. In particular, investment into key research angles of the technology has been relatively light (including environmental and ecological impacts, which will need to be clearly understood and taken account of before any larger scale FPV projects can even be considered in the UK). As a result of this (and other factors such as the lack of government policy on the sector), “floatovoltaics” is still seen as something of an unknown to investors and represents more of a risk than other tried and tested methods of generating electricity (and income therefrom).

As with agrivoltaics, investment in FPV projects may benefit from various UK government funds and programmes that support renewable energy and sustainable agriculture in general, such as the aforementioned CfD scheme.