Can floating solar farms be the answer to our energy crisis?
Solar Farms and solar energy has been one of the go to solutions in terms of clean and renewable energy over recent years. As solar panels become more efficient and science gives us a deeper understanding into this technology; more and more people are beginning to join in and acquire solar panels in one form or another. They are only one form of renewable energy, but certainly one of the most famous ones. Plans to build giant farms in deserts have gone ahead and whilst this provides a great energy input, it’s not always the most efficient or best solution the heat can cause problems when transmitting electricity over long distances. There is a climate impact too, deserts have a function of reflecting rays back to the atmosphere, so covering deserts completely could change local climates, which in turn could affect climates on a global scale.
One company in Switzerland, seems to have found a way to cause minimal impact to the environment, whilst providing electricity to thousands of homes simultaneously. It’s early days yet but it looks promising.
The floating solar farm located in a dam reservoir lake in Southern Switzerland, is able to collect energy from the sun at high altitude with higher intensity UV rays, with cold and windy climates the solar farms efficiency is equivalent to that of solar farms based in deserts, the snowy regions of the Alps helps direct the sun towards them too. There is little to no aquatic life on dam lakes due to it’s man made functionality, so this would minimise the impact on wild life and ecosystems.
Questions remain however, can filling all the lake dam reservoirs in the world with solar panels provide enough energy for the planet? What about places that are not mountainous or don’t have the infrastructure to attempt these solutions?
