Compensation payments put on an equal footing: what the Infrastructure Future Act means for agrivoltaics and battery storage

4 min read · Updat­ed on 22 Octo­ber 2026

At the end of June 2026, the Bun­destag adopt­ed the Infra­struc­ture Future Act (Infra­struk­tur-Zukun­fts­ge­setz) in order to notice­ably accel­er­ate plan­ning and approval pro­ce­dures for trans­port infra­struc­ture projects. A change to the Fed­er­al Nature Con­ser­va­tion Act that looks incon­spic­u­ous at first glance is also of con­sid­er­able rel­e­vance for the solar and stor­age indus­try. It is there­fore direct­ly sig­nif­i­cant for agri­v­olta­ic projects such as those that Ylek­tra devel­ops, builds and oper­ates in Ger­many.

The core point: compensation payments and on-site compensation will rank equally

Until now, a clear order of pri­or­i­ty applied to nature con­ser­va­tion com­pen­sa­tion for unavoid­able impacts on nature and the land­scape: first it had to be exam­ined whether an impact could be off­set by com­pen­sa­tion or replace­ment mea­sures on site or in the sur­round­ing area. Only if this was demon­stra­bly impos­si­ble could a com­pen­sa­tion pay­ment to the com­pe­tent nature con­ser­va­tion author­i­ty be con­sid­ered. In addi­tion, there was an exten­sive duty to jus­ti­fy this, and often a months-long search for suit­able com­pen­sa­tion land.

The Infra­struc­ture Future Act now removes this order of pri­or­i­ty: under the new Sec­tion 15(6a) of the Fed­er­al Nature Con­ser­va­tion Act (BNatSchG), com­pen­sa­tion, replace­ment and com­pen­sa­tion pay­ments will in future rank equal­ly. A jus­ti­fi­ca­tion of why direct com­pen­sa­tion in nature is not pos­si­ble is there­fore no longer required. In this case, the search for com­pen­sa­tion land can be dropped entire­ly. Instead, a pay­ment is made to the Fed­er­al Envi­ron­ment Min­istry or the com­pe­tent state min­istries, which is invest­ed in nature con­ser­va­tion mea­sures for that spe­cif­ic pur­pose.

Why does this also affect agrivoltaic systems and storage?

The new rule was orig­i­nal­ly aimed at clas­sic trans­port infra­struc­ture, mil­i­tary projects, telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions and projects financed from the spe­cial fund for infra­struc­ture and cli­mate neu­tral­i­ty. How­ev­er, the rec­om­men­da­tion of the lead Trans­port Com­mit­tee extend­ed its scope. Sec­tion 15(6a) sen­tence 3 BNatSchG now express­ly pro­vides that ener­gy infra­struc­ture falling under the over­rid­ing pub­lic inter­est under Sec­tion 2 EEG is also cov­ered. The new rule there­fore also applies to ground-mount­ed solar sys­tems, includ­ing agri­v­oltaics. In addi­tion, the scope was extend­ed to stor­age under Sec­tion 11c of the Ener­gy Indus­try Act (EnWG).

Distinction from the parallel amendment of the Federal Building Code

A sim­i­lar rule is also planned in the ongo­ing amend­ment of the Fed­er­al Build­ing Code (BauGB), but there only for projects realised through a devel­op­ment plan. The amend­ment to the Fed­er­al Nature Con­ser­va­tion Act now adopt­ed in the Infra­struc­ture Future Act goes much fur­ther. It express­ly also cov­ers instal­la­tions priv­i­leged under build­ing law, for exam­ple ground-mount­ed solar projects realised with­out their own devel­op­ment plan through a priv­i­lege under Sec­tion 35 BauGB. For the solar indus­try, the BNatSchG rule is there­fore poten­tial­ly the more wide­ly effec­tive of the two leg­isla­tive changes.

Timetable and reactions from industry and nature conservation

The law requires the con­sent of the Bun­desrat, which still has to approve it on 10 July 2026 before it can enter into force. The Ger­man Solar Indus­try Asso­ci­a­tion (BSW-Solar) has long cam­paigned for exact­ly this sim­pli­fi­ca­tion of nature con­ser­va­tion com­pen­sa­tion for solar projects. It is there­fore like­ly to wel­come the exten­sion to Sec­tion 2 EEG.

The trans­port sec­tor also approves: infra­struc­ture oper­a­tors such as Deutsche Bahn expect equal treat­ment to bring a notice­able accel­er­a­tion at the start of projects, because the search for land for com­pen­sa­tion mea­sures has so far tak­en a great deal of time. Nature con­ser­va­tion asso­ci­a­tions, on the oth­er hand, view the change crit­i­cal­ly. They warn of a break with a prin­ci­ple of envi­ron­men­tal and nature con­ser­va­tion law that has been estab­lished for around 50 years. They also fear a de fac­to weak­en­ing of on-site com­pen­sa­tion. This crit­i­cism main­ly con­cerns clas­sic trans­port projects. Nev­er­the­less, it is like­ly to con­tin­ue to be dis­cussed in its appli­ca­tion to ener­gy infra­struc­ture.

What this means in practice for agrivoltaic projects

• Short­er approval pro­ce­dures: The often months-long search for suit­able com­pen­sa­tion land can be dropped if a com­pen­sa­tion pay­ment is made instead.
• Less jus­ti­fi­ca­tion effort: Devel­op­ers no longer have to prove in each indi­vid­ual case why on-site com­pen­sa­tion is not pos­si­ble.
• Greater plan­ning cer­tain­ty: A com­pen­sa­tion pay­ment can be cal­cu­lat­ed finan­cial­ly and sched­uled, unlike an uncer­tain, often lengthy search for land that can delay the project timetable.
• No com­pro­mise on nature con­ser­va­tion qual­i­ty: Com­pen­sa­tion pay­ments flow, ear­marked, into nature con­ser­va­tion mea­sures of the com­pe­tent min­istries and replace eco­log­i­cal com­pen­sa­tion not in sub­stance but in organ­i­sa­tion.

For Ylek­tra as a project devel­op­er, EPC com­pa­ny and oper­a­tor that active­ly man­ages approval pro­ce­dures for track­er agri­v­olta­ic sys­tems, the new rule opens up an addi­tion­al option in project plan­ning, pro­vid­ed the Bun­desrat approves as expect­ed. Espe­cial­ly at sites with a lim­it­ed sup­ply of suit­able com­pen­sa­tion land in the sur­round­ing area, this can make the dif­fer­ence between a project that is approved quick­ly and one that is blocked for months.

Conclusion

With the Infra­struc­ture Future Act, a rule orig­i­nal­ly intend­ed for trans­port, mil­i­tary and telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions projects is also opened up to solar instal­la­tions and stor­age under the EEG and EnWG. Whether and to what extent this actu­al­ly speeds up approval prac­tice for agri­v­olta­ic projects will become clear once the Bun­desrat has approved it on 10 July and the first author­i­ties apply the new equal rank­ing of com­pen­sa­tion, replace­ment and com­pen­sa­tion pay­ments in prac­tice. Ylek­tra is fol­low­ing fur­ther devel­op­ments and will assess the impact on ongo­ing and planned projects here.

Are you plan­ning an agri­v­olta­ic project and want to know how cur­rent leg­isla­tive changes affect your approval process? The Ylek­tra team advis­es on per­mit­ting, cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and imple­men­ta­tion.

Get in touch now and send us a What­sApp mes­sage to +49 2236 3953989 or use our con­tact form.