Agrivoltaic system with tracker technology: Ylektra builds a 5.1 MWp project in Soest

7 min read · Updat­ed on 22 Octo­ber 2026

In Soest-Deir­ingsen, Ylek­tra is start­ing con­struc­tion of an agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem with track­er tech­nol­o­gy. The project, with an out­put of around 5.1 MWp, com­bines agri­cul­tur­al use, solar pow­er gen­er­a­tion and shared use of exist­ing grid infra­struc­ture with a neigh­bour­ing wind farm. Sin­gle-axis track­ers in 2P con­fig­u­ra­tion are used. More than 90 % of the land remains avail­able for farm­ing.

Construction start in Soest: Ylektra develops and builds an agrivoltaic project

In the Soester Börde, con­struc­tion has begun on an agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem that com­bines three key require­ments: agri­cul­ture, solar pow­er gen­er­a­tion and effi­cient use of exist­ing grid infra­struc­ture.

The sys­tem is being built on arable land owned by farmer Markus Schlot­mann in Soest-Deir­ingsen. Ylek­tra designed the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem and is respon­si­ble for turnkey imple­men­ta­tion as EPC gen­er­al con­trac­tor. This includes plan­ning, per­mit­ting, pro­cure­ment, con­struc­tion, grid con­nec­tion coor­di­na­tion and com­mis­sion­ing.

A spe­cial fea­ture: the project is being realised out­side EEG sup­port. This is made pos­si­ble by par­tic­u­lar local con­di­tions, coop­er­a­tion with Stadtwerke Soest on elec­tric­i­ty off­take and shared use of the grid con­nec­tion infra­struc­ture with a neigh­bour­ing wind farm.

Why agrivoltaics reduces competition for land between agriculture and solar power

Ger­many wants to expand installed pho­to­volta­ic capac­i­ty sig­nif­i­cant­ly by 2030. A large part of this expan­sion will take place on open land. At the same time, agri­cul­tur­al­ly valu­able arable land is lim­it­ed and indis­pens­able for pro­duc­ing food and ani­mal feed.

Con­ven­tion­al ground-mount­ed solar often takes agri­cul­tur­al land out of reg­u­lar cul­ti­va­tion for decades. Agri­v­oltaics address­es exact­ly this con­flict of objec­tives.

Agri­v­oltaics refers to pho­to­volta­ic sys­tems in which land is used for agri­cul­ture and solar pow­er gen­er­a­tion at the same time. Food, ani­mal feed and renew­able elec­tric­i­ty can thus be pro­duced on the same land.

With the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem in Soest, more than 90 % of the land remains avail­able for farm­ing. The project thus com­bines the expan­sion of renew­able ener­gy with main­tain­ing agri­cul­tur­al use.

Agrivoltaics category 2 under DIN SPEC 91434

In Ger­many, what counts as agri­v­oltaics is described by DIN SPEC 91434, among oth­er things. It dis­tin­guish­es two basic cat­e­gories:

• Cat­e­go­ry 1: high­ly ele­vat­ed sys­tems under which farm­ing takes place.
• Cat­e­go­ry 2: ground-lev­el sys­tems where farm­ing takes place between the mod­ule rows.

The sys­tem in Soest is designed as cat­e­go­ry 2 agri­v­oltaics under DIN SPEC 91434. In cat­e­go­ry 2 sys­tems, a sub­stan­tial part of the land must remain avail­able for farm­ing. With more than 90 % of the land still farmable, the sys­tem in Soest is well above this thresh­old.

The project thus shows how ground-lev­el agri­v­olta­ic sys­tems can be planned so that they remain com­pat­i­ble with mod­ern agri­cul­tur­al cul­ti­va­tion.

Tracker technology: single-axis tracking in 2P configuration

For the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem in Soest, Ylek­tra uses sin­gle-axis track­ers in 2P con­fig­u­ra­tion, with two mod­ules arranged one above the oth­er on one axis. Over the course of the day, this axis fol­lows the posi­tion of the sun from east to west.

Sin­gle-axis track­ers are track­ing sys­tems that auto­mat­i­cal­ly align PV mod­ules with the posi­tion of the sun. The mod­ule angle there­fore changes over the course of the day.

Track­er tech­nol­o­gy has sev­er­al advan­tages for agri­v­oltaics:

• High­er and more even yields: over the course of the day, the mod­ules are more often at a favourable angle to the sun. Espe­cial­ly in the morn­ing and evening, the sys­tem can there­fore gen­er­ate more elec­tric­i­ty than a fixed south-fac­ing sys­tem.
• More valu­able gen­er­a­tion pro­files: with track­ers, solar pow­er is dis­trib­uted more wide­ly over the day. A larg­er share of gen­er­a­tion there­fore falls in the morn­ing and evening hours, when solar pow­er can often be eco­nom­i­cal­ly more attrac­tive than at mid­day.
• Mov­ing shade instead of per­ma­nent shade: the move­ment of the mod­ules spreads the shade across the land over the day. The crops between the rows there­fore receive more even­ly dis­trib­uted light.

This com­bi­na­tion is par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ing for agri­v­oltaics, because elec­tric­i­ty gen­er­a­tion and agri­cul­tur­al use have to be con­sid­ered togeth­er.

More than 90 % agricultural use despite photovoltaics

A cen­tral point of the project is main­tain­ing agri­cul­tur­al cul­ti­va­tion. The row spac­ing of the sys­tem is designed so that Markus Schlot­mann can con­tin­ue to farm the land with agri­cul­tur­al machin­ery.

The sub­struc­ture of the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem is pile-dri­ven with­out con­crete foun­da­tions. As a result, the area actu­al­ly sealed remains well below 1 %.

Soil pro­tec­tion was also a focus before con­struc­tion began. The ground inves­ti­ga­tions, includ­ing dri­ven core sound­ings, were coor­di­nat­ed with the har­vest cycles in order to treat the arable soil as gen­tly as pos­si­ble.

Shared grid infrastructure with a wind farm and battery storage

The agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem in Soest will feed in via the grid con­nec­tion of a neigh­bour­ing wind farm. Each instal­la­tion has its own feed-in capac­i­ty, but they share cen­tral parts of the infra­struc­ture, in par­tic­u­lar the cable route and the grid trans­fer point.

Wind and sun com­ple­ment each oth­er in their gen­er­a­tion pro­files: pho­to­voltaics sup­plies elec­tric­i­ty main­ly dur­ing the day and in sum­mer, while wind ener­gy more often achieves high yields at night and in the win­ter months. Com­bin­ing both types of gen­er­a­tion allows bet­ter util­i­sa­tion of the grid.

This approach is becom­ing increas­ing­ly impor­tant for project devel­op­ers and landown­ers. Free grid con­nec­tion capac­i­ty is today one of the biggest bot­tle­necks in the expan­sion of renew­able ener­gy. The com­bi­na­tion of agri­v­oltaics, wind ener­gy and, in future, bat­tery stor­age can help to use exist­ing infra­struc­ture more effi­cient­ly.

How agri­v­olta­ic projects can be fur­ther opti­mised with bat­tery stor­age is shown in our arti­cle on agri­v­oltaics with bat­tery stor­age.

Outside EEG support: why planning certainty still matters

For Ylek­tra, the Soest project shows that new busi­ness mod­els can enable pho­to­volta­ic projects out­side con­ven­tion­al EEG sup­port under suit­able con­di­tions. At the same time, a sin­gle project does not replace a reli­able reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work for the mar­ket as a whole.

“In Soest we are show­ing that agri­v­oltaics can be realised out­side EEG sup­port under the right con­di­tions. But that does not mean the indus­try can do with­out a clear and reli­able reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work.”

Dr. Michael Peters, Man­ag­ing Direc­tor of Ylek­tra GmbH

Long-term invest­ment in ener­gy infra­struc­ture requires plan­ning cer­tain­ty. Inno­v­a­tive busi­ness mod­els can com­ple­ment a reli­able reg­u­la­to­ry frame­work, but not replace it.

Ylektra as project developer and EPC general contractor

Ylek­tra sup­ports the agri­v­olta­ic project in Soest over the entire project life cycle. As project devel­op­er and EPC gen­er­al con­trac­tor, Ylek­tra is respon­si­ble for the tech­ni­cal, eco­nom­ic and con­struc­tion imple­men­ta­tion.

This includes:

• project devel­op­ment
• per­mit plan­ning
• grid con­nec­tion plan­ning
• tech­ni­cal design
• pro­cure­ment
• con­struc­tion coor­di­na­tion
• turnkey con­struc­tion
• com­mis­sion­ing

For the own­er, Markus Schlot­mann, this means clear inter­faces, a sin­gle point of con­tact and project imple­men­ta­tion geared towards agri­cul­tur­al use from the out­set.

“Agri­v­oltaics solves the prob­lem of com­pe­ti­tion for land between agri­cul­ture and solar pow­er gen­er­a­tion. That is why I delib­er­ate­ly chose an agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem.”

Markus Schlot­mann, farmer and own­er

Commissioning of the agrivoltaic system planned for mid-2027

Com­mis­sion­ing of the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem with track­er tech­nol­o­gy in Soest is planned for mid-2027. Until then, Ylek­tra is fol­low­ing the con­struc­tion site in a series of arti­cles on ylektra.com.

Fur­ther insights into key project phas­es are planned:

• pile foun­da­tions and sub­struc­ture
• instal­la­tion of the sin­gle-axis track­ers
• shared grid con­nec­tion with the wind farm
• pos­si­ble opti­mi­sa­tion through bat­tery stor­age
• com­mis­sion­ing and oper­at­ing expe­ri­ence

The Soest project shows how agri­v­oltaics, track­er tech­nol­o­gy and intel­li­gent grid infra­struc­ture can be thought of togeth­er.

FAQ on the agrivoltaic system with tracker technology

What is an agrivoltaic system with tracker technology?

An agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem with track­er tech­nol­o­gy com­bines agri­cul­tur­al use and solar pow­er gen­er­a­tion on the same land. Track­ers align the PV mod­ules with the posi­tion of the sun over the course of the day, so yields can be dis­trib­uted more even­ly over the day.

Which agrivoltaic system is Ylektra building in Soest?

In Soest-Deir­ingsen, Ylek­tra is build­ing an agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem with an out­put of around 5.1 MWp. Sin­gle-axis track­ers in 2P con­fig­u­ra­tion are used. The sys­tem is planned as cat­e­go­ry 2 agri­v­oltaics under DIN SPEC 91434.

What are the advantages of tracker technology for agrivoltaics?

Track­er tech­nol­o­gy can dis­trib­ute elec­tric­i­ty gen­er­a­tion more even­ly over the day. In addi­tion, the move­ment of the mod­ules makes the shade move across the land instead of lying per­ma­nent­ly in one place. In agri­v­oltaics, this can ben­e­fit the crops between the mod­ule rows.

Does the land at the Soest agrivoltaic system remain available for farming?

Yes. With the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem in Soest, more than 90 % of the land remains avail­able for farm­ing. The sealed sur­face is well below 1 %, because the sub­struc­ture is pile-dri­ven with­out con­crete foun­da­tions.

What role does Ylektra play in the agrivoltaic project?

Ylek­tra is project devel­op­er and EPC gen­er­al con­trac­tor. The com­pa­ny is respon­si­ble for plan­ning, per­mit­ting, pro­cure­ment, con­struc­tion and com­mis­sion­ing of the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem.

What does agrivoltaics category 2 under DIN SPEC 91434 mean?

Cat­e­go­ry 2 describes ground-lev­el agri­v­olta­ic sys­tems in which agri­cul­tur­al cul­ti­va­tion takes place between the mod­ule rows. With this type of sys­tem, a large part of the land remains avail­able for agri­cul­ture.

When is the agrivoltaic system in Soest to be commissioned?

Com­mis­sion­ing of the agri­v­olta­ic sys­tem in Soest is planned for mid-2027.