Site selection of desert solar farms based on heterogeneous sand flux

Abstract

Site selection is a priority for building wind and solar farms in deserts, which has to consider the dune threats associated with sand flux, such as dust contamination and sand burial. Thus, understanding changes in sand flux can optimize the site selection for wind and solar farms in deserts. Here, we use the ERA5-Land hourly wind data with 0.1°×0.1° resolution to calculate the yearly sand flux for the period 1950–2021, and adopt the mean of sand flux to score the suitability of global deserts for wind and solar farms. We find that global deserts are dominated by low flux potential (≤20 m2 yr-1) and resultant flux potential (≤1.0 m2 yr-1) over the past 72 years, and the scoring result indicates that most deserts have low suitability for building wind farms, and high suitability for building solar farms. Our study optimizes the site selection for wind and solar farms in deserts, and contributes to achieving the affordable and clean energy target by 2030 under the framework of the United Nations sustainability development goals.