How Much Longer Can We Tolerate Further Loss of Farmland Without Proper Planning? The Agrivoltaic Case in the Apulia Region (Italy)

The energy transition from fossil fuels to renewables is part of a more general ecological transition that the European Union (EU), among others, is actively pursuing. Despite significant progress, Italy lags far behind the EU's target of generating 55% of its electricity from renewables by 2030, compared to 36% today. Renewable energy is a very spatially dispersed form of energy, and land-use change is a particular issue that needs to be addressed if a significant number of renewable energy installations are to be located on agricultural land. In agrivoltaic systems, energy production is coupled with food production on the same land unit, thus ensuring crop yields. In this way, the conflict between energy and food may be reduced, but the impact of these installations on the landscape remains, and community discontent and unrest are on the rise. These land-use conflicts and impacts recall the need for rigorous spatial planning which must play a leading role in managing this transition. Prior to planning, the availability of resources should be known and evaluated. To this end, a GIS-based analysis was applied, taking into account a set of criteria in a three-step approach: a) the entire protection system identified by the Apulian Landscape Plan was used to obtain a Constraint Map; b) the agricultural land use and capability classification together with land slope and exposure was used to obtain the Availability Map; c) agricultural land conversion scenarios were developed to quantify the achievable capacity of agrivoltaic installations.Pressures undermining the agricultural sector leading to the conversion of land to other uses. The energy sector should be a leverage factor to promote rural development and support agriculture, not the other way around.