Floating PV in mountain artificial lakes: a checklist for site assessment

Abstract

Floating photovoltaics is a emerging approach to deploy photovoltaics on water bodies. Thanks to its high overall global potential and the extensive experience gained (with more than 2 GWp installed and than 510 plants, up to 2020), it represents a promising venue for expanding renewable electricity production worldwide. However, a local assessment for sustainability is needed for this potential to be converted into specific projects attracting the attention of stakeholders. This paper provides an original and wide-ranging screening checklist that allows for site assessment, with a view of separating suitable from unsuitable sites and emphasising that appropriate design can solve difficulties linked to the site features. It offers an extensive list of activities that international, national and regional authorities, investors, solution providers, local communities and civic society, environmentalists and other stakeholders might undertake for a fruitful dialogue. It explores the possibility that art, architecture and industrial design may play a role in increasing the touristic value and the public acceptance of new plants. Although the checklist can be used in other conditions, a particular attention is paid to mountain artificial lakes used as reservoirs by hydro-power plants, since they have potential high synergies (and a global potential of over 3.0 TW) but also may encounter significant implementation issues.

Techno-economic assessment of power generation potential from floating solar photovoltaic systems in Bangladesh

“…All the lakes were artificial, as it should be for FPV installation. This is because the man-made water reservoirs are generally stagnant and detached from the river or the ocean which makes them perfect for FPV installation [ 16 ]. Note that, the water bodies selected for the study do not include all the man-made water bodies in Bangladesh.…”

Possibilities of Using Floating Solar Photovoltaic Panels on Water Reservoirs in the Island of Crete, Greece

“…The solar-PV system could generate 186.05 GWh el /year covering at around 20% of the plant's power demand. Piana et al, 2021 have examined the criteria for selecting the best sites for installing floating solar panels on mountainous lakes. The authors stated that mountainous lakes can combine generation of "hydroelectricity" with "solar electricity".…”

“…Water temperatures in water dams are relatively constant all over the year while they are lower than air temperatures during the summer. Several criteria have been proposed for selecting the best surface water reservoirs for installing floating solar panels (Piana et al, 2021). Most of the man-made water dams in Crete are owned by public authorities including municipalities.…”

Hybrid Floating Solar Plant Designs: A Review

“…Floating photovoltaics is a typical solar technology that involves mounting solar panels over natural or man-made bodies of water rather than placement on terrestrial systems [35,36]. FPV systems are classified into three major groups based on their supporting structures: (1) Fixed Tilt arrays: rigid pontoons are required; (2) Tracking: it can be installed with or without pontoon; and (3) Flexible arrays: Due to the low weight, no supporting structure in the form of the pontoon is needed; FPV can also be classified based on the scale of implementation: small scale (few kW), medium scale (kW to MW) and large scale (MW to GW) [37].…”

“…Complex mooring system: The requirement of a complex mooring system for HFPV is a significant limitation. It is unable to withstand heavy high winds, warranting a huge proportion of mooring points to keep it intact [35]. The occurrence of flash floods necessitates careful mooring/anchoring to avoid panel destruction [107].…”