According to the exclusive mapping of the Brazilian Association of Photovoltaic Solar Energy (ABSOLAR), investments in distributed photovoltaic solar generation in rural properties already exceed R $ 1.2 billion in the country. According to the entity, rural producers currently represent 8, 7% of installed power in generation distributed from the sun in Brazil.

In accumulated terms, the distributed solar photovoltaic generation has about 2.3 gigawatts (GW) of installed power, including homes, businesses, industries, rural producers, public buildings and small land. With a total of approximately 200 thousand systems in operation, the photovoltaic solar source corresponds to 99.8% of the modality connections in the country, being the leader in the segment.

The ABSOLAR survey shows that, in total, there are already more than R $ 11.9 billion in investments accumulated since 2012 in distributed photovoltaic solar generation, spread across the five national regions. As a result, solar photovoltaic technology is present in more than 79.9% of Brazilian municipalities.

In number of installed photovoltaic systems, residential consumers are at the top of the list, representing 72.60% of the total. Then, there are companies from the commerce and services sectors (18%), rural consumers (6.3%), industries (2.7%), public authorities (0.4%) and other types, such as public services ( 0.04%) and public lighting (0.01%).

“The use of photovoltaic solar energy with agribusiness brings competitiveness gains to rural producers, as it reduces electricity costs, increases electrical security, protects consumers against increases in electricity tariffs, increases the supply of electricity in rural properties , makes production in the field cleaner and more sustainable and adds value to the rural producer's brand ”, comments Ronaldo Koloszuk (photo), chairman of ABSOLAR's Board of Directors.

Rodrigo Sauaia, CEO of the entity, highlights that there are several applications of photovoltaic solar energy in the rural sector. “The technology is extremely versatile and can be used in pumping and irrigating water, in cooling meat, milk and other products, in regulating temperature for the production of poultry and chickens, in lighting, in electric fences, in telecommunication, in the monitoring of the rural property, among many other functionalities. The synergy between the agribusiness and the photovoltaic solar is enormous ”, explains Sauaia.