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Flexible Floating Football-Field Sized Solar Panels (digitaltrends.com)
mdsolar writes: Offshore wind farms are growing in popularity as energy providers look for different ways of harvesting power from the sun without using valuable land resources. One unique idea being developed by engineers at Vienna University of Technology is a floating platform called a Heliofloat that would function as a sea-based solar power station.... an open-bottom, flexible float as large as a football field and covered from edge to edge with solar panels. Heliofloats can operate as standalone platforms for smaller operations with moderate energy requirements. Multiple heliofloats also can be connected together, forming a floating solar-harvesting power grid.
Each heliofloat is 100 meters long, reportedly cheap and easy to build, and may eventually be used to power desalination plants and biomass extraction.
Each heliofloat is 100 meters long, reportedly cheap and easy to build, and may eventually be used to power desalination plants and biomass extraction.
Offshore wind farms are growing in popularity as energy providers look for different ways of harvesting power from the sun without using valuable land resources.
Which is why coastal states are now experimenting with offshore nuclear reactors, to harness the geothermal energy derived from burning coal.
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Offshore wind is done only because of the favorable winds, not because of land costs or availability. Solar doesn't need to go offshore, it only adds to the cost. If you've ever been around ocean mist, you know how quickly it covers clear surfaces with deposits.
A good place to put such floating panels are the hydropower reservoirs.
Large surface is available, of little use, power lines and converters are nearby, and the wind is less strong at the bottom of these lake than on sea.
Hey, all you people who think it's such a great idea to build stuff to use all that open space on the ocean: Talk to a few boat owners first. You'll quickly come to understand that between wave action, salt water spray getting into every crack and crevice, corrosion, and biological fouling (both below from crustaceans and seaweed, and above from bird and seal droppings), you're constantly fighting to keep the damn thing from falling apart within a few years.
Just save yourself a lot of heartache and build the thing on land, or even on top of freshwater reservoirs. Anywhere but the ocean. You don't put structures there unless you have to.