How Offshore Solar Could be the Future of Energy
How Offshore Solar Could be the Future of Energy. Go to brilliant.org/Undecided/ and get 20% off your subscription and a 30 day free trial with Brilliant.org! What’s stopping us from converting the open ocean into a massive solar power plant? After all, land has always been a complicated issue in the world of renewables, and as populations grow denser, it’s all the more relevant. How do we balance the urgency of the clean energy transition with the space needed for agriculture, housing, and conservation? Establishing offshore wind farms is one way. But it also turns out that we can also stand to gain a lot from offshore solar. That is, if we can figure out how to steady marine floating photovoltaics in the same way we’re already experimenting with freshwater FPV. Developing seaworthy panels is a lot more complicated than smashing a bottle on the array and setting sail. So, what makes ocean FPV worth a shot? And what’s holding it back?
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So do you think offshore solar is a good direction? Go to brilliant.org/Undecided/ and get 20% off your subscription and a 30 day free trial with Brilliant.org! If you liked this, check out Is This Accidental Discovery The Future Of Energy? kzhead.info/sun/jd2SYbSEi56jh2g/bejne.html
Spoileralert, it wont be the future. I watched this channel alot. You shouldnt jump on every "innovation" and put a clickbait title on every video. Get's boring fast.
This is something I have been lightly following for some time. I think it is a great addition to the power toolkit. I am a firm believer in multiple sourcing of power. I do not think we have any tech that is a good single source provider. What we have is a scale of trade-offs involving: Expense - Planning, Zoning, Design, Property Procurement, Transportation of Materials, Construction, Operations, ... Pollution - Raw Materials, Transportation, Manufacturing of Components, Operational, Waste Products, End of Life Concerns, ... Stability - Seismic, Weather, Geopolitical, Crime, Substrate, Foundation (water vs rock for instance), Business, Social Acceptance, ... Reliability - Solar, Wind, Geothermal, Fuels, Tidal, Nuclear, etc all bring various levels of stability to the table. Maintainability - Cost & Availability of Replacement Parts, skills, remoteness, ease of work, market stability, ... Transportation - Logistics tail to support installations, Transportation Requirements (vehicles and skills), Supplier locations,... Security needs - Level of Protection needed, How defensible are the installations, Risks from simple vandals to terror attacks, ... There are other issue to consider, but these cover quite a few. There is always the unexpected. Solar is very vulnerable to anything that obscures the the solar radiation it can absorb, so dust is a big problem. Or, imagine building a solar farm and then "just next door", someone builds a tall building that will block the sun during the middle of the day. Stranger things have been allowed and will be. This is why getting creative is a good thing. Having a mix of "tricks" is a good thing. Every locations that we take power from alters the environment. Maybe a little, maybe a lot. The trick going forward is going to be getting the power we need without destroying the locations we get it from. That is something the current power industry have been fighting for years, the public push back the destruction of the world that burning fossil fuels has caused. Even Solar has issues with the production process for the solar panels and the eventual end of life for the same. Still nothing near what burning fossil fuels causes, but a problem none the less.
I think offshore solar could work in conjunction with wind and wave power using some of the same infrastructure. It doesn't seem to make any sense alone.
It would be a great excuse to get the infrastructure in place for something likely to be far more effective: offshore hydro. The kinetic energy of the oceans would be a far more dependable source of energy, available 24/7 without the need for expensive battery storage. I'm not actually talking about tidal power, which situates equipment where the ocean environment is at its most brutal, but farther from shore, below the surface, and preferably where seafloor topography creates a strong, steady current.
The total cost of using freshwater solar when you include the cost of land acquisition should be a no brainer, however the ocean is far too hostile an environment. I would prefer to see the total cost of covering all the parking lots with solar compared to using land that would be better used for agriculture, and the same value using dessert land.
Anyone who has ever worked in a port, or related to anything marine, knows that the ocean devours. the ocean breaks. the ocean clogs everything.
Exactly, stupid idea.
Now this is the type of video which, after 5-6 years, people will look at and say "those were really the initial stages and look at where we are today" . But I hope we can effectively shift to newer, much eco friendly sources of energy. Btw, nice video Matt. Appreciate it. ❤
I like the idea of FPV reducing evaporation of calm fresh water reservoirs and aquaducts, floating solar could locally help power pumped hydro and water flow. Also, coastal areas tend to get fog
Yeah, I just ran the math, and I think about 8% of the total flow of the Colorado River is lost through evaporation from (the famously drought-afflicted) Lake Powell and Lake Mead. Covering half of each lake could reduce evaporation to 4%, and could generate a whopping 60GW of power. Recreational boaters on the lakes would be unhappy.
@@aaronclair4489 Check out the other video on floating solar. FPV is generally not optimised to reduce evaporation. It reduces evaporation by about 30%.
@@GerbenWulff but surely improvement will continue, and 30% is still massive when you consider the volumes we're talking about. Deployed on canals and aqueducts and the like where the surface area to volume ratios are much higher than a lake would have a larger effect as well.
It seems like a no-brainer to add floating solar on a hydroelectric Reservoir. In a situation like Lake Mead even more important because the water levels have been dropping to the point where the water intakes for the turbines are above the water line. At which point you cannot produce power from the water
@@aaronclair4489 "Covering half of each lake could reduce evaporation to 4%" It would also adversely impact the ecology of the lakes.
Having visited a few buildings about 50 to 100 meters from shore om the east side of caraibbean islands and witnessing the mushy growth of more than 10 centimeters of salt, algae and other slimy stuff on and in them, I recon offshore floating solar can only work with a rigorous maintenance schedule from the start, which makes them lose the couple of percent of added gain - in maintenance
Yep, the ocean is going to destroy those things in short order. She is way too experienced at ruining anything you put in her or on her.
In fact I even doubt the gain.
Maybe we need to gene-edit some salt water snails to crawl around and clean them.
@@cathyhaynes2903 Maybe combine it with a floating fish farm to have the fish eat up some of the fowling to reduce maintenance.
I was going to post something similar. I've lived most of my life near the ocean and I can tell you that it will destroy ANYTHING no matter how well built. There is a reason why boats are considered money pits and they are DESIGNED to be near the water. Oceanographic instruments have to be replaced constantly. That's why I doubt these ocean wind farms over time. Windmills already have high maintenance costs but then factor in the ocean and I have a hard time believing they will do anything other than lose money. Solar panels are even more fragile. I mean even on land the solar electronics fail all the time due to damage from the elements even though they're supposedly built for it and sealed really well. On the ocean it's going to be 100x worse. I can't see it working without some sort of supernatural protection from the elements.
Can we get a pun counter on here? He delivers everything so naturally without skipping a beat.
Some interesting developments. I'd just like to point out that floating off-shore drilling platforms do NOT weather heavy storms. For example the ones in the Gulf of Mexico will often stop drilling operations and get towed hundreds of miles during hurricane season in order to avoid storms. Of course offshore PV could do something similar, leaving a sub-surface power connection behind while towed out of harms way. And like some other promising energy technology, there is the issue of where the energy is 'harvested' and where it is needed. Transmitting power long distances isn't cheap.
I guess I don’t understand how this is easier than panels on every rooftop? I understand the space thing in dense areas but roofs of everything seems simpler.
Im sure both can happen, but with most people living close to the coast it provides more options.
@@SomeKidFromBritain But living near the coast limits where these can be so close proximity isn’t a good argument. Shipping lanes, fishing areas, boating, and just the view would stop this from working in most populated areas vs just going on every roof. Or am I missing something amazing about this idea?
@@SnappyWasHere Everything has downsides and challenges. The future of clean energy will be a mix of solutions.
@@SomeKidFromBritain That is true plus dependence on one form is not good also.
To me its a matter of efficiency. Each rooftop needs its own set of batteries, panels, grid circuits and soi on. All to provide a very limited amount of power. A single high rise may be able to produce enough solar to service maybe 1 or two apartments out of 100/1000 or more units in a residential building. Its just not cost effective. Even out where I am in a rural area, I can produce 20% of my power needs from solar with a very large array of panels, and that's only in the fall and spring where usage is minimal. My investment was substantial and I did the math, I will not recoup my costs over the life of the equipment. To me its mor like emergency backup power not primary production. Centralizing it makes it more efficient on costs. Fewer people to manage, eliminate redundant systems, logistics and so on. Not going to say its still a good idea large scale, but that was not your question any way.
Thank you for bringing up the "what about just building on land" in the intro. Was immediately skeptical so appreciate you covering it.
Thanks for this, Matt. As someone who lives on the water, I was disappointed that you didn't bring up that these systems are also a hazard to navigation. Yes, we always sail with someone on watch, & yes, they can make sure that these flotovoltaics are well lit at night, but it *is* an issue, especially for us small boats. And charts are slow to be updated, & slower still to be distributed, so sailors may not be expecting them, at least until they become more common. These are relatively small issues in the greater scheme of things, & there are mitigations, but they're important to us & to other cruisers (as we call ourselves).
I would certainly like to do a deeper dive into this topic. Thank you for all you do!
Thanks for watching!
I think you are right to be skeptical of their cost and performance numbers. There's also the performance impact and maintenance cost of salt crust on the panels. And, they are claiming a 10% performance increase on the water, while also using thin films cells (which have lower performance). Hmm, 10% better than land-based thin films?, or 10% better than land-based conventional panels?
Thanks for the great work, Matt! My first reaction is that this is too cute by half. The ocean is like a desert: nobody lives there. That means that any power you generate must be transported over large distances and that hikes costs. It may see applications in places like Singapore or remote islands where space is at a premium. But outside those niches? I don't think so.
Excellent point & my thoughts exactly! Me thinks that the ocean is already polluted enough!
Transferring energy over these relatively small distances doesn't cost much. These panels on the ocean are more efficient and have less thermal wear and tear. And avoid needing to buy/lease land.
Our food lives there.
Time to build cities in the ocean then!
I see them being useful as electrical charging stations for ocean-going vessels.
Your content is interesting, well researched, very well presented - and just plain awesome. Thank you
Pairing offshore solar with existing wind farms might make sense, provided conditions were favourable. Even some flexible PV wrapped around the sun facing sides of the turbine tower could make for a good boost in power generation. Plus transmission cables are already there!
...and a calm evening...what do you do then...??
@@manoo422 It's a bit of a physics thing, but wind tends to blow more at night than it does in the day. So calm conditions are more likely during the day when your solar is producing.
@@manoo422 Use other energy sources. Nobody is suggesting wind and solar need to provide 100 percent of power 100 percent of the time.
@@jdillon8360 Try to think of a way you can make use of intermittent power supplies when you have a country to run 24/7...
@@manoo422 You're right. There's no solution. Australia has wind and solar and when it's not windy or sunny we just live in the dark and all industry and transport shuts down cause we don't have any other means of making or storing electricity.
Just cover the huge parking lot
Parking garage AWNING 😂
@@hybrid.roodragon1226 it's definitly easier and cheaper compared to offshore
I’m glad that a lot of them are being built over fresh water and canals, it’s just smart. Especially if over bridges and by dams
I like your videos, there factual and informative! Not just waffle. Thank you
Wow. You are great at making these cohesive
great video! love the real life implementations showcase. Those lilypad floaters are exciting
I would like to see highway medians and verges explored as solar farm installations locations. For the most part, these areas are easily accessible and otherwise not used for any productive use. Of course there may be a traffic safety issues which would need to be dealt with on a case by case basis.
@@devilselbowNot if you put up the appropriate barriers.
I think it would be possible to design a system where the tethers to the ocean floor are capable of pulling the array under the surface a few meters when wave and wind conditions become hazardous. This could be combined with wave energy harvesting through the same tethers, as well as undersea pressurized volumes for energy storage from both the solar and wave sources. The submersible structure also provides a way to clean the panels, and given that storage and transmission infrastructure is there, might as well throw some wind turbine in the mix.
Brilliant and glad I read the comments... I was gonna type out the virtually same idea....with poorer Grammer! LOL. You can use the floats as ballasts too , adding water to them to help them sink. Would be more work for the panels though making them 100 percent water proof instead of really water resistant!
If you're already floating a structure on water with waves, seems as if you're already halfway to generating wave power.
@@davidrenfro5756 I think you just about have to make them sea water proof in the first place, or it is never going to work. In one embodiment the cells could be put on part of the surface of very large cylinders that are mostly submerged such that just the strip with the cells is above the surface. Then the cylinder could rotate to provide some level of sun tracking through the day, and keep rotating through the night to bring up the cells on the other side in the morning. This cleans the cells at night (with some brushes underneath) and if bad conditions are happening, it just advances the rotation to put the cells in the protected zone underneath until calm seas return.
Moving parts under salt water is a bad idea.
@@Ken00001010I believe they’d actually have to be pulled some number of feet below surface to prevent wave damage, depending on the area. Even in the calmest areas of the ocean a storm can generate swells of 20 feet or more, in fact in extremely rare circumstances this size of wave is possible even on the Great Lakes. So agree in principle with your suggestion but just that the solar array may have to be submersible to a greater depth, which does increase the complexity and difficulty of the solution.
I'm sure this is possible, but i can't imagine there's a lot of ocean where it makes any sense. You say it makes the most sense near the equator... where we generally have lots of desert where we could put them instead. It takes a lot of plastic to float these panels vs a couple simple metal brackets on land _and_ the land based panels aren't getting covered in salt spray.
Several companies are attempting to convert the open ocean into a massive solar power plant using floating solar panels. However, the engineering and maintenance challenges are significant, and the cost could be too high. Floating photovoltaics (FPV) is a relatively new branch of the solar industry, with global installed capacity expanding beyond 1,000 MW around 2018. FPV has three major benefits: it does not occupy limited space on land, solar panels on water stay cooler, and bodies of water shielded by FPV are less prone to evaporation, which helps preserve freshwater supplies. One of the largest solar farms in Europe, built on Portugal's Alqueva reservoir, has seen an efficiency increase of up to 10% and an average annual productivity increase of around 4% due to water's cooling effect. However, applying the technology to the ocean is challenging, and several questions arise, such as whether the panels will be smashed to pieces during storms. Floating photovoltaics, or floatovoltaics, is a new branch of the solar industry that involves solar panels moored within a body of water. FPV has three major benefits, including not occupying limited space on land, performing better on water, and shielding bodies of water from evaporation. While the technology has become more common with about 3.8 GW installed by 2021, the technology is still in its infancy and needs to be developed further. Recently, companies like HelioRec and Ocean Sun have attempted to put solar panels out on the ocean, but the engineering and maintenance challenges felt insurmountable, and the cost would be too high. Although FPV is already an emergent use of canals, lakes, and artificial reservoirs, applying the same tech to the ocean is more challenging. FPV is a boon and is being tested in places like the United States and India, where miles of canals are being used to determine if FPV is a boon…or boondoggle. According to Pedro Oliveira, the Director of Innovation at EDP, a Portugal utility, its FPV farm has seen increased efficiency thanks to water’s cooling effect. He cites an efficiency increase of “up to 10%” along with an average annual productivity increase of around 4%. A separate 2021 ENEL Innovation Lab FPV study found that floating systems can produce anywhere from 4% to 7% more energy than ground-based solar. The challenges of floating solar panels in the ocean include developing seaworthy panels that can withstand storms and maintaining the panels.
We need that in typhoon prone areas. We just need a system that can easily be assembled and disassembled and stored in a steel container on shore. After a typhoon the grid will be down for weeks or months. If we can roll out floating solar in areas after being hit by typhoons, we can power these areas quickly after a storm. I have a couple of solar panels on land in a typhoon prone area. I mounted them in a place where I can easily take them down and move them inside when we get a typhoon warning.
singapore Water Ultitles installed floating photovoltaics which deserves mentions, on the tengeh resorvoir
Thank you for the commentary. If these systems are shown to be viable it makes sense to use them.
I think we can first put floating pv on reservoirs and dams. Instead of making it a standalone it can act as a water feature bridge so that it has multiple uses and multiple benefits.
Seems like a great idea, especially when pared with offshore wind since the transmission cables are already laid. The obvious pairing would seem to se wave generators, however. These things are already designed to ride the waves, attaching a device to collect wave energy seems like a natural fit.
With so many companies working on more durable, and even flexible solar panels, this is going to get more and more viable. A mix of solar and wave energy harvest would be amazing. On clear days there's less wave energy, but the solar makes more power. On stormy days the solar is blocked out, but the wave energy harvest makes up for it.
Thank you for this show.
One of the best things about floating solar panels on lakes or ponds it has many benefits and one of them it reduces the water evaporating to reduce water lose when theirs droughts
1:01 "Dive into the world of floating solar" LOL I saw what you did there! Sounds like FPV and offshore tidal harnesses would go well together.
With PV cost currently in free-fall, it's easy to get numbers that show an edge for your favorite system: just use out-of-date numbers for the competitors' prices. When things settle out, though, I will be very surprised if ocean floatovoltaics beat landlubber PV, other than in a handful of politically determined situations. Saltwater is expensive to deal with. It's worth doing so if your system is very concentrated, with lots of value in a moderate area, such as a container ship's worth of goods in an area the size of a container ship. With solar power, the resource is inherently spread out. Maybe I'll be surprised, and anti-fouling plastics will turn out to be great. But if so, it will revolutionize shipping first, and there's no sign of that yet.
11:05 I would love if cities near lakes or bays would design these to function as floating walkways because that looks like fun. You would want to reduce the amount of people walking on the panels with railings to keep people on the outsides. I live in DC so I would suggest the tidal basin right next to the Jefferson memorial but given how divisive people are they would say it would ruin the reflections and overall aesthetic. Maybe someday people will come to appreciate the positives of renewable and either overlook or appreciate the aesthetic.
Excellent presentation Matt. You have a sharp effective team to work with . I am curious if you have recently done a report on Hydraulic Wave action electric generators that work with wave action forcing large pistons to generate electricity ? I know just recently we had one installed here in Oregon just near the shore where the waves and swells generate a good amount of electricity.
The big question is does the increase in energy production offset any ROI calculations. Personally being part of marine construction, the cost to do simple things tend to be quite a bit more expensive and drives up final project cost.
I think this would be a cool niche product. Shipping container it to a remote area for emergencies or new construction or offshore projects.
Make 2 gigantic iron chains and tie them to a Circular, Empty Metallic Well with 1 mile diameter, whose bottom is filled with a single layer of huge Solar Panels. 1 Iron chain is used to pull the well in 1 direction towards sun rays during dusk and the other chain to pull towards sun rays at dawn. The well should be tall enough to prevent animals jumping into it. After any rains, maximum amount of water in it should be drained out with a big tap(s). Remaining water should be pumped out to keep the Solar Panels dry. 2 poles stuck into the water should help for pulling with those 2 iron chains that are attached to 2 structures on the shore. Basically one L shaped pulling during dusk in one direction and another L shaped pulling in the other direction at dawn. Start with a small system and keep on scaling up with more and more systems after gaining more and more experience !
i think the increased mantainance and complexity offset the increase in performance... the best placement for photopanels are building's roofs: they already exist, they are easily accessible, their building is alredy likely connected to the grid, the soil and environment underneat is already used/compromised... suncovers for parking lot is also a winwin: the parking already exist, and the shade keep the cars cooler
Looks good. Thanks again for the vid. We actually have some of our fishing licence money used by the government to install FADs (Fish Attracting Devices) off the coast to help marine life. FPVs should do the same. Jim Bell (Australia)
I would use solar for shade on streets. Add those little wind based genarators at the edges, and the street under this will have shade, and any shaking that may have destabalized it, is also used for power.
Have a look at Solar Duck as well, their prototype looks pretty solid. Since my background is development of offshore construction equipment, I do have some experience in the field.
Love this idea, as with all new ideas, the engineering will evolve to eliminate issues and bring costs down. For me in open water, fish seem to gather under anything floating, could the underside of the floaters also have natural fish nursery elements built in? A good design might also add rigidity or act as a stabiliser.
Here in NZ, we have many small to medium Hydro plants which of course have lakes. All the electrical infrastructure is already in place, so to me its a no-brainer to combine solar with Hydro, and both benefit
Fascinating subject.
Many of the tech featured in your Wave Power video could also benefit by being covered with solar panels to increase their production.
The one item not covered with offshore solar PV (oceans) is the cost to connect to the grid. To be less disturbed by shortening of wave spacing near shorelines, the arrays will need to be place further offshore. Wind on ocean make sense, as wind speeds over open oceans are higher, thus contain much more energy. IMO: floating solar PV is more economic on fresh water where wind speeds are lower, and there are many secondary benefits. Just as combining solar PV with farming has added benefits for both solar and for crops. Another example not mention here is solar on hydroelectric reservoirs in Thailand. An advantage is the grid infrastructure is already located at the hydroelectric power station.
Hey Matt, what about geothermal underwater in locations where the seabed emits massive heat, like in rifts with lava underneath and such
What you gain in land cost (I would assume almost zero for water) you lose in creating the artificial land. I love it, especially around the equator where you have too much heat absorbed into the water anyway. Hope they can work around the harsh environment, I see it being less problematic than wave power.
Set up resiliant fixed moorings in an optimal area for seabased PV. To each mooring connect a large RC controlled boat topped with PV panels. Whenever a large storm approaches the boats scatter to survive the storm individually with the dangers of collisions out of the way. After the storm the boats are guided back to their moorings to generate and transmit power.
Also the boats return to port for maintenance and upgrades then sent out again. The amount of boats can be increased as needed. As for the moorings, I envision one central mooring connected to land and the rest branching off from it.
I forgot to say that the power is transmitted via the moorings and cables connected to them. One mooring is connected to land/the grid/whatever needs the power. Other moorings are connected to that main mooring.
Do the panels have to be in contact with the water to get the cooling effect? Like if they’re in a framework above the water do you get the benefits? Also the tropics are hot and from my visit to Kenya and Nigeria; well those places at least were pretty humid cloudy and hot and don’t some equatorial spaces get rain everyday at noon (peak solar time). Also like Nigeria has this black mould growing on all the buildings
The maintenance labor would be ridiculously high. Salt water splash will leave salt deposits on the panels which will have to be constantly cleaned or just accept the reduced productivity from lessened light infiltration
Not just the cost of getting maintenance crews there would be higher, but the material degradation due to the adverse environment would be much higher as well. There's no advantage for efficiency like there is with wind, either -- the Sun shines the same no matter if you're on land or out at sea. Then you have transmittion losses on top of that. And all that when there's no need to look at the water as a surface at all, since there's still so, so much free space on land. There is no way this is worth it until every roof top and every parking space is already covered. And even then, it would be a stretch.
Love the ATP shirt! I think floating solar is a great idea. Great video.
ATP!
@@UndecidedMF 🎶 They didn’t meaann to… Accidental! 🎶
What is the reason, why we just dont put some solar panels on those wind turbines? Put them around a height, where the blades end. Since from top to bottom those pillars become wider you simply could attach them with steel cable.
additional question... why not Buildings? im pretty sure those tall vertical boxes get plenty sunlight during the day, also they already need quite a chunk of energy to operate so might as well kill 2 stones with one bird
Can you do a follow-up video to show where California is with covering the Colorado River diversion channels with PV?
The visual at 7:49 displays Hadley cells. The Coriolis effect is predominantly a horizontal influence. In the northern hemisphere, the Coriolis effect causes wind to curve clockwise, in the southern hemisphere counter-clockwise. Another advantage of solar panels over drinking water reservoirs is the blocked light which minimizes, and may prevent, the growth of cyanobacteria which are becoming more prevalent.
"This is what's known as the Coriolis Effect" Shows the animation of and talks about the Intertropical Convergence Zone
Love the videos! They answer questions I didn't even know I had 😂
In theory we could build offshore platforms (similar to the oil ones), and cover them in solar and/or wind. This would work especially well for wind turbines that don't have to be a certain distance from other wind turbines. There is already a company in the Netherlands that combines solar and wind on tall buildings. Perhaps their technology could be adapted to offshore platforms too.
Sounds like freshwater poisoning waiting to happen
I'm curious, I wonder what research has been done on the possible reduction of storms in the area caused be efforts to reduce evaporation? With the wind currents across the central US and what not I'm curious how much precipitation we may be loosing in rainfall from the lower humidity or if there's an issue with cloud formation.
Are all of those PV's wrapped with aluminum? Or are some of them flexible like the ones coming out for emergency power and off grid camping power?
There's people who chase tornadoes and utilize an effect that essentially sucks a cone to the ground when it is being blown by high wind speeds so maybe it's possible to make a clear version of that to put over floating solar panel farms which may be able to expand the region that floating solar panels are viable in
I wonder if this could be done in a way to actually help coral habitats, cooling the waters locally and also providing new anchors for corals to attach to.
Didn't think about corals, but I had a similar thought about kelp forests. The ideal would be some way that the installations are integrated with nature, such that it provides shelter for animals that help with some of the maintenance e.g. cleaning
I feel like we should be focusing on the sahara first. The countries there could use the economic boost from selling off power that is generated on their land, and most of that land is uninhabitable as it is. Also, covering a significant portion of the sahara could have a cooling effect on the area, and possibly allow it to support plant life again. That's not to say we shouldn't put any effort into floating solar, but it should definitely be focused more toward the areas that clearly benefit the most from it (like preventing evaporation of canals, etc in arid environments, or agrovoltaics).
Thank you. I think that this is a good direction.
Thanks for watching, Ron!
When will we see experimental hybrid wind turbines made of solar panel materials? Or floating solar combined with kinetic / wave energy capturing devices (underneath the solar panels)....? So many possibilities.
Regard biofouling: A small fraction of the output power can be applied periodically to the submerged conductive parts of the structure, (with polarity opposite to that used in growing "electrocoral") to prevent marine organisms such as barnacles from being able to produce hard and heavy shells. The electrolytic effect would instead dissolve the shells, making the structure quite repellent to those organisms, and probably to softer kinds of biofouling as well.
Matt, what about the carbon footprint of maintenance? Cost of transmission? Seems like we should put our energies in other directions. If we are in the water maybe rather wave energy?
why not put solar on reservoirs in CA/NV/AZ etc? it will help keep the water cooler and reduce evaporation
There is already one large scale project on a reservoir in Portugal
They already do it (Portugal), you can see it on the fully charged show
Brazil has some projects as well.
They gotta put this on lake Powell. Arizona sun and less evaporation? Needed!!
I wonder what it could grow too if these guys paired with the Wave power generation. Be an interesting idea I think.
I wonder how practical it would be to anchor the floating panel with wave generators at the same time?
Might as well have desalination going in as well, and wave motion power
What I don't understand is why OTECs haven't taken off. Ocean Thermal Energy Convertors as a concept is very resilient to weather and surface conditions. Can you do another update on this, please?
Probably because the focus is on making a quick profit from worthless pv solutions. Rather than an actual solution that requires lots of work developing work and certainly massive infrastructure at massive cost. Just build a coal power station instead, sorted.
I agree it is a good technology. It’s probably gotten less interest because it requires specific coastal or sea locations with high thermal gradient. Unlike solar which can be plopped down anywhere. So orders of magnitude less R&D money. But I’d expect it to start taking off eventually.
My lake approximately 30 acres and about 20 of those acres are very shallow 2 m in depth on average. I was only going to put 1 acre of solar panels in the most shallowest spot and record the temperature of the water underneath. The problem is that the water heats up too much, and it becomes oxygen deprived in the heat of the hottest part of the summer. Algae takes over and duck weed, and it becomes more of a swamp . I want to aerate the lake and cool the water down so that I can dissolve more oxygen into it for trout hatchery
My first thought was, "Can they combine these with a wave/tidal system?"
there is a lot of energy in the waves. in places that are too rough for solar maybe something that captures wave energy. I live at lake tahoe and it always seems to be windy.
very innovative i love ideas like this smashing the like
interesting choice of location...
Combine this with a wave power system… that would be interesting and possibly even out power production in varying weather conditions…
Great idea put them over top of coral reefs, might even save the coral for a little while..
Placing sea based PV in timezones east of large cities reduces the need for energy storage. Use HVDC (High Voltage Direct Current) transmission to get the energy farther without power loss.
It's certainly less of an eyesore than offshore wind. The added benefit of fish attracting could be good for fishing too. Symbiotic relationship.
I can see the case for canal fpv. Shoot it even makes some sense with reservoirs. But in the ocean? Why?
How is the power accessible. What size cables are required to connect these far away floating energy fields to the local power system? Seems to me that could also be a factor.
It’d be the same as offshore wind
Been watching as the algorithm recommends, but the ATP shirt finally clinched the subscription 😂
I can’t see producing only offshore solar as efficient material wise…but combined with wind…wave and possibly salt used to help all in one station…BRILLIANT!!! The wind and wave processors could minimize forces on the panels.
Solar should be located close to where it is used. Its flexible sizing and quiet operation are two of its greatest advantages for local installation. For the same security and infrastructure reasons as big power plants, large solar installations are less than optimal.
Great idea, but very difficult to develop mostly due to corrosion and water spays
I feel like if we have an overabundance of cheap (*and hopefully recyclable solar panels) the "torn apart by storms issue is less of a problem. Just make them quick and easy to swap out after being damaged.
With floating solar panels, it seems like it would be fairly simple to make them track the sun. 2d solar tracking can increase output by about 20%. Just have the entire platform move to track the sun. A simple cable and wench system could do it.
combining FPV with wave turbines would be best solution, we need all kinds of solutions where they fit best
I went online to find that current SPV contributes 3% of the current energy mix. The strategy is for SPV to contribute 30% of the Zero emissions supply in the future. at present SPV takes 8 to 10% of current silver production. Supplying 30% of the power mix would consume 100% of total silver production. Can you do that ?
I don't know, I live in Salt Lake City and the Salt film gets on everything
Thank you and good morning!
Good morning!
Love the ATP shirt! 😊
Like saltwater is extremely corrosive, plus damage caused by weather and waves, then add to it that the pannels gonna lie flat( or undulate on more or less flat plane) thus the wont face directly the light and thus have less than ideal performance( on land panels are mostly tilted towards sun). both extremely high either( or prolly both) maintenance costs and/ or cost of additional protection against elements and the actual effectivity of the panels will prohibit this concept from being anything more than just concept. rather than trying to square circle and try to mimic land conditions on open sea( even on land solar panels just recently became economically viable option for electricity generation) it'd be better to use how different sea is from land and concentrate on tides and waves as a means of generating power.
a wind turbine in calm water with a platform of solar panels built above 10M height, the structure if buikt with wind torsion forces in mind could be an added energy generator for the turbine and its systems