| Floating solar
It is located within 10km of a population centre. It is not situated within a protected area. The duration of ice cover is less than six months. The water body has not dried up during the study period.
After selecting sites considered suitable to host FPVs based on these constraints, 94% of the water bodies studies by Woolway et al were deemed unsuitable according to their criteria. This left 67,893 water bodies remaining in the researchers’ global dataset, with a total estimated annual power output of 1302TWh across them.
A considerable fraction of the global power output
from FPV would be generated from water bodies located within specific countries, including large ones such as China (252 TWh), Brazil (170 TWh) and the US (153 TWh). However, some comparatively smaller countries can also produce a considerable amount of electricity from FPV. The example was given of Papua New Guinea which with 19 TWh was the country with the 12th largest estimated total power output from FPV within the study. Not only is it located near the equator where solar irradiance is high but it is also home to some large water bodies, such as Lake Murray (647km2
) and Lake Kutubu (49km2 ). Woolway et al also estimate that if all of the feasible
water bodies have 10% of their surface area covered by FPVs (up to 30km2
), 3% of countries considered in
their study could meet their energy demands. Some countries such as Bolivia with FPV production of 9TWh almost meets its energy demands (11 TWh in 2021), while others such as Ethiopia can generate 129% of electricity demand from FPV. As this analysis suggests, the countries with the greatest total power output from FPVs are typically those with the greatest electricity demand.
Crucially, Woolway et al add, FPV could also
increase access to electricity to communities in some nations. For example, in Chad or Malawi, where the installation of FPVs in selected water bodies could contribute substantially to national electricity demand (73% and 29%, respectively); approximately one-tenth of the population of these countries do not have access to electricity. The global deployment of FPVs could also lead to a but
total annual reduction of 0.45 billion tonnes of CO2
there are also unknown impacts of FPVs on water body carbon cycling, plus their knock-on effect on things such as CO2
emissions from water bodies. However, FPV technologies do have the potential
to reduce water scarcity. Water loss via evaporation is accelerating globally under climate change and it is thought that FPVs can exert a dual influence on evaporation rates. They can do this by: Creating a shading effect, decreasing water surface temperature and consequently suppressing the vapour pressure gradient at the air–water interface, a key driver of latent heat fluxes and, in turn, evaporation.
Acting as wind barriers, further dampening evaporative losses, as wind speed is positively correlated with evaporation rates.
Woolway et al say their study found that the countries with the greatest potential for FPV (in terms of the power generated) are also those that experience the highest evaporative losses. Therefore this highlights the combined benefit of installing FPVs in these
www.waterpowermagazine.com | December 2024 | 37
countries, to both help meet electricity demand and address water scarcity. Studies have also suggested FPVs could help
mitigate the occurrence of algal blooms, which have increased in many inland water bodies in recent decades, with implications for water availability and ecosystem function. By creating a shading effect, FPVs directly reduce light availability which is a critical factor limiting the growth of algae. As the authors go on to add, the installation of FPVs on artificial bodies of water such as reservoirs is likely to be more straightforward because of the presence of existing infrastructure,. And from a technical standpoint, installing them on hydroelectric reservoirs can optimise energy efficiency and improve system reliability. Integrated hydroelectric–FPV systems may also lessen the environmental and social impacts of standalone hydroelectric operation providing, as the authors describe it, “synergistic benefits to the water– food–energy nexus”. “However, it is important to consider that whereas some infrastructure is already in place in hydroelectric reservoirs, they might already be operating at full operational capacity, meaning that systems will need to be updated to receive additional power from FPV,” the authors state.
Above: Engineers work on floating photovoltaics
Below: New research suggests there’s 14,906TWh of potential for floating solar photovoltaics on over one million water bodies worldwide
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