Additional options include:
- Partially cover agricultural fields that get too much sun (yes, it is possible for a plant to get too much sun, depending on the species)
- Cover water reservoirs with floating panels, which both cools the panel (improving its efficiency and lifespan) and lowers evaporative water losses.
- Cover patches of desert, which get a ton of sun.
- Cover rooftops.
Regarding point 1 thats called Agrivoltaics for those interested
Deserts are ecosystems that must be protected. If you must put them in fields, incentivize farmers who grow corn for ethanol production to install solar instead.
Let’s actually stop giving out ethanol incentives. Shits dumb
True, but out of all the ecosystem the one which gets the highest insolation per square meter requires the lowest amount of square meters of disruption for a given amount of power.
Disruption for who? It is incredibly disruptive to the flora and fauna.
For square meters of physical space.
Yeah, but also both. In Europe we don’t have that many car parks, we have underground parking below buildings. So yeah, we still need solar parks.
It’s more that we should cover more infrastructure, since that area has already been claimed by humans.
That too, just saying that in Europe that’s not enough since we are generally more efficient with space already. Still, all the shaded parking lots I’ve seen where I live already have solar panels above.
Yeah, America is shit
The zoo in my city did this. Not only does it generate power, it saves power by keeping the cars cool so people don’t need to use A/C to bring it down to a normal temperature.
It has become law in France, any new carpark of a given size must be covered with solar panels.
There are a lot of fields in the US dedicated to growing corn for use in fuel which could instead be used for solar panels. Also what is shown is potentially a terrible idea if a car runs into one of the poles or someone is stupid enough to try to park with a vehicle that crashes into the sides of the panels
Edit: Please see this extremely well made video about renewables https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgxb8I1nk2I
Also what is shown is potentially a terrible idea if a car runs into one of the poles or someone is stupid enough to try to park with a vehicle that crashes into the sides of the panels
They do have covered parking where you are from yeah? Or is that some magical novelty to the natives?
I’ve never seen covered parking (not counting indoor parking), but also I’m not american. Maybe solar panels like that would work, but as shown in the photo does make me sweat a bit
Also not southern European I imagine.
nope, norwegian
Build separated bike lanes with solar panels on top. Now you’re making energy and people can commute by bicycle more comfortably in all weather.
Or put up trees, those help. I’d put them on people’s roofs, connected to their own electricity.
Well, it’s not either/or.
The idea is to put them literally everywhere, so you have enough solar power for everything even on cloudy days in winter.If you took the fields used to grow corn for “biofuels” in the US and covered them in solar panels, they would produce the annual US energy need many times over!
Cover our roofs, make the streets cars free.
The issue, as always is money. It is far cheaper to build close to the ground than high in the air. That solar field will payback far faster than a solar parking lot.
I mean, that is not a field, that is a lawn.
Solar panels covering grassland does much less ecosystem damage than any fossil fuel generation, or constructing parking lots or lawns for that matter.
We shouldn’t gatekeep solar panels, just fucking install them!
Technology Connections did a whole video on it. In the US you could use the space currently farming biofuels and it would generate 10x the energy.
Cover bicycle parking instead!
