Sweet Cherries Under Dynamic Agrivoltaics for Rain and Heat Protection
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.52825/agripv.v4i.2802Keywords:
Climate Change, Fruit Racking, Fruit Protection, Heatwave, Prunus Avium, Shading CropsAbstract
Heavy rains before harvest and heatwaves are a risk to cherry tree yield. In this study, a dynamic agrivoltaic (DAV) system was tested as a solution to protect sweet cherry trees from heavy rains before harvest and high temperatures in summer. The study was done in a commercial sweet cherry orchard in France planted in 2004 with three cultivars (‘Primulat’, ‘Burlat’ and ‘Bigalise’) in a north-south orientation (18° east). In 2022, the orchard was divided into two homogeneous zones. One zone of 1200 m2 located in the north of the orchard was used to install the DAV system while a zone of 1800 m2 located in the south of the orchard was preserved intact as the control treatment. The DAV system consists of bifacial photovoltaic solar panels positioned at 5.65 m height and oriented along the direction of crop’s rows which can rotate +/- 90° to adjust the level of shading of the trees. In this study, solar panels were placed in horizontal position during rain events before harvest and solar-tracking position (maximum shading for the trees) when air temperature was above a given threshold. In 2024 and 2025, multiple rain events were observed during the ripening period of cherries. In 2024, when heavy rain was observed, fruit cracking was significantly reduced in the DAV system for ‘Primulat’ and ‘Burlat’. There were no significant differences for 'Bigalise', which presented very low cracking values in 2024. In 2025, moderate rain was associated with low cracking values. Regarding heat protection, defoliation occurred after the harvest of 2023 and 2024. Before the defoliation, air temperature in the DAV treatment was recorded up to 2°C cooler than in the control. The control trees experienced a higher level of shoot defoliation in 2023 for 'Burlat' and 'Primulat'. In 2024 the control trees experienced a higher level of shoot defoliation for 'Burlat'. The result of this study indicates that DAV systems can be used to reduce fruit cracking due to heavy rain before harvest and minimize the risk of defoliation when trees are shaded during periods of high irradiance and temperature.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Gerardo Lopez, Giovanna Ceriello, Vincent Hitte, Séverine Persello, Perrine Juillion, Jérôme Chopard, Arturo Ramos-Fuentes, Sophie Bellacicco, Damien Fumey
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Accepted 2026-03-12
Published 2026-07-08