The agricultural sector is facing mounting demands to enhance energy efficiency within farm enterprises, concurrent with a steady escalation in electricity costs. This paper focuses on modelling the adoption rate of photovoltaic (PV) energy within the dairy sector in Ireland. An agent-based modelling approach is introduced to estimate the adoption rate. The model considers grid energy prices, revenue, costs, and maintenance expenses to calculate the probability of PV adoption. The ABM outputs estimate that by year 2022, 2.45% of dairy farmers have installed PV. This is a 0.45% difference to the actual PV adoption rate in year 2022. This validates the proposed ABM. The paper demonstrates the increasing interest in PV systems as evidenced by the rate of adoption, shedding light on the potential advantages of PV energy adoption in agriculture. This study possesses the potential to forecast future rates of PV energy adoption among dairy farmers. It establishes a groundwork for further research on predicting and understanding the factors influencing the adoption of renewable energy.

翻译：农业部门正面临在农场企业中提升能源效率的日益增长需求，同时电价也在持续上涨。本文聚焦于建模爱尔兰乳牛业中光伏（PV）能源的采用率。引入了一种基于主体的建模方法来估算采用率。该模型考虑电网电价、收入、成本和维护费用，以计算光伏采用的概率。主体建模输出结果估计，到2022年，已有2.45%的乳牛场安装了光伏系统，这与2022年实际光伏采用率相差0.45个百分点，从而验证了所提出的主体建模方法。本文通过采用率数据证明了人们对光伏系统日益增长的兴趣，揭示了农业中采用光伏能源的潜在优势。这项研究有望预测乳牛场未来光伏能源的采用率，为后续研究预测和理解影响可再生能源采用的因素奠定了基础。