Do you think solutions like solar canals are a good idea? The first 100 people to use code UNDECIDED at the link below will get 20% off of Incogni: incogni.com/undecided. Corrections: 07:42 - Should read 238 billion liters, not million If you liked this video, check out Solar Panels Plus Farming? Agrivoltaics Explained clip-share.net/video/lgZBlD-TCFE/video.html
@Thunderstormworld Stupid is as stupid does. And, all their waterways are toxic, they don't have the envirinmental protection laws that California has, that Pres Bush Sr put into place.
Just like Agrovoltaics combining two things to be greater than either single thing alone sounds like a huge win to me. It will be great to see more of these installations in the future.
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I saw the thumbnail and that's exactly what it reminded me of. Also massive home rooftop solar panels, instead of over reliance on extremely expensive and time consuming transmission lines from huge solar and wind farms even though they have their place as well, but we would need less of them.
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@M33f3r Depends, you have agrovoltaic installations that are build higher to allow tractor access underneath (It think the testproject in Germany did this), ofcourse this is more costly, but it is something you can look at.
This is genius. I go out of my way to buy things that have duel purposes, I've always lived this way. I recycle where ever I can and I reuse what other people would call trash. I make furniture out of cardboard boxes and throw very little away. That's why I say, this is genius. Keep at it guys, you'll get it completely right. Use a pivot arm to pull panels out of the canal for repair work and for cleaning the canal.
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Great idea. I wonder how much water would be saved as it slows down evaporation and save more water? I live in the South end of the San Joaquin Valley in California and the draught has had major consequences on the population. A few years ago the wells on the East side of town dried up. There was no drinking water and the area had to have water containers put in peoples yards and they had to use public showers for bathing.
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@ISuckAt GuitarAndBass42 I like comments like this. This is not a one solution issue. Its going to take a multitude of changes and implementations and ideas of all kinds. We need solar, we need wind, we need hydro, we need geothermal, we could really use more nuclear but everyone is so afraid.
@ISuckAt GuitarAndBass42 yeah I didn’t say it would be. Considering that the amount of water falling on the state doesn’t really change, a 10% bump would be huge. My worry is that instead of changing water use people just go back to normal.
Dear Matt Ferrell, I admire your videos and look forward to every new video. I am a chemistry teacher, and I love to explain some of my lectures through videos to make complex ideas easy, perceptible and funny for my students. Please, could I ask with what programm/softaware do you make your videos? I am looking forward to your response! Many thanks in advance! PS: Any help/suggestions from other readers are much appreciated!
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I am curious to know if this will have an impact in the following two areas: 1. The cloud formation and hence the rain, since covering these water bodies would mean lesser evaporation. 2. The general temperature in the nearby areas since the breeze from water bodies is a major factor in determining the temperature that is felt on the nearby land areas. Do we have studies/calculations for educating us for these two impacts?
Mere paas dono question ka ans hai bhai 1. Only nehar par solar penal lagege us se kuch nahi hoga 0.0000000001% ka fark aayega kyu ki nehar se pani kheto me jaa kar bhaap ban ke ud jayegaa 2. Temprature me bhi koi bhi fark nahi aayega kyu ki nehar se koi bhi temprature me utar chadav nahi hoti hai jab tak nehar kaa pani kheto, nadiyo, uskhi pade nalo, jhilo, or kheto tak nahi pahuchta bhai me kisaan hu me 10 saalo se kisani kar raha hu jab bhi hum apne kheto me pani dete hai (hum matlab 2 4 km ke area ke kisaan jo sam ek saath boni karte hai or ek saath pani dete hai ) to temprature me 5°se 7° degree Celsius kam ho jata hai. 🙏🙏🙏👍👍👍
These are narrow, man made aqueducts. Any added moisture in those areas are not natural so limiting it will only help restore the local area back to its natural state.
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Sounds like a great idea especially if the long term benefits of reducing the water lost to evaporation and the impact this could have decades from now
Hey Matt, Question I see a lot of your video's like this that have grand Ideas about using Solar panels to help fix the worlds energy/environmental crisis. My question is, what kind of impact would it have environmentally to create all of the solar panels for some of these well intentioned and possibly ground breaking and world changing projects?
@Jf aamand I don't expect him to get super deep into it... And I enjoy his videos for what they are... High level overviews if proposals and ideas. For me it's a good way to get a lot of information about a subject without needing to know the nitty gritty details. My question was more directed at a possibility of a video that maybe addresses the idea that there are some of these over arching issues with some of the purposes ideas and maybe there are companies or tech that are looking to solve those huge issues.
Matt is not a scientific guy. Dont expect anything from him other than his own personal opinion. But if you look up how solar panels are created and assume you would use them en masse like Matt suggests in his videos it would surely be an environmental disaster. He makes good money from youtube so i dont expect him to make any change to his half-baked format anytime soon
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These ideas, integrating and dual functions is clearly the way to go. Solar panels capacity to shade and cool what is below makes a huge amount of sense.
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I'm trying to think of ways to get sun to the dark side of the earth without making it day time for everyone 24/7. Only way I can think to do it is to shoot a lazerbeam all the way around earth which I don't even think it possible. Probably get almost no energy by the time you get to the dark side. We got all these solar panels doing NOTHING at night time. That's a tough problem to fix if it's impossible to just easily bounce a lazerbeam onto mirrors in space all the way around to the dark side
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Every time I have driven between San Francisco and LA on I5 I have wondered why the irrigation canals aren’t covered… and why they aren’t covered by solar panels. It just seems like a good idea and I’m glad to hear that it may become a reality!
@acflory "Climate Change" has been on-going for 4.57bn years. You Communists wont stop it from changing no matter how much Communism you try. Who again are the Climate Changing Deniers? George Washington was shooting Redcoats because of an over-priced stamp. What would George be doing to Communists today is what you Commie/Fascists should be asking yourselves.
Open irrigation channels were a cheap option back when we didn't know/didn't care about climate change. They've now become a luxury we can no longer afford.
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Interesting. I wonder what sort of knock-on effects this would have though; less water being evaporated (maybe less rainfall?), and less sunlight reaching the ecosystem in the water below.
Ahhh, i remember reading about this in Indian state of Gujarat. It was supposedly the idea of current PM of India who was CM of Gujarat at that time some 15yrs ago. Its a very cool method. It prevents water from evaporating during summer & water helps improve efficiency of Solar Panels by cooling it down.
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Sure, installing panels over a canal might be more expensive, and the cost saved on water might not be worth the power generated, but you save huge upfront on land acquisition, clearing and right of way costs. And in a place like India where land acquisition is a challenging task since farmers are unwilling to give away their lands, these projects bring in more benefit in the form of more water and power to irrigate lands, power companies and of course for the environment. Also, it's good for food security and energy security of a country that doesn't have any meaningful oil/gas reserves or even any transitional form of energy until renewables technology catches up to scale. Like you said, win, win, win. Only concern still is the eco-friendly manufacturing of solar panels, access to rare earths. Coming to maintenance the automated systems are already available and seems like a good bet. Coming to floating photovoltaics I feel like the power generated can be used with a pumped storage type hydropower system where we use solar to pump the water and use as potential energy or battery, avoids using battery storage altogether which requires rare earths to manufacture, of course might not work for all plants and geographies. But every bit helps the planet. Drops can make an Ocean.
Covering the aqueduct has been proposed ad infinitum, whether just a cover or solar panels. Using large pipeline vs open channels was considered in the 50's. Open channel was just easier to inspect and repair. A cover, solar panels above or floating on the aqueduct has numerous issues. Since there are numerous check structures, turnouts, pumping plants, and if "debris" (ie, cover material and solar panels break up) are in the water, more time will be needed to shut down the water flow, disrupting deliveries, to clean out debris. Especially when there is a break in the channel. Disruption to deliveries has to be absolutely minimized. There have been other suggestions regarding placing small hydrogenators throughout the length of the aqueduct. Reducing the energy of the flow (increasing friction thereby increasing water elevation.... see Bernoulli's equation) was not viable.
India started doing this a fee years ago with some success...my belief with renewable has always been how to use it over existing infrastructure. I understand that at times the only options is massive solar farms, it still hurts to watch useful recently active farm land get plowed over and turned into a solar farm because that makes more money then food production. This is a good idea in my book just needs to be implemented correctly.
If this would be implemented there hopefully a program for recycling the solar panels would be implemented at the same time. Currently most solar panels just go straight to the landfill which would take forever to break down considering the materials they are made with.
Since California desperately needs to save every drop of water possible, a potential savings of 82% of evaporation is potentially huge. Depends upon how much canal is covered. If not that much power is required, perhaps they go ahead and cover additional canal anyways, then they have more power than customers require for a couple of potential projects. Project number 1: Use extra solar energy, only at the time it is generated (to save from any storage costs), to use for desalination plants to produce some of the additional water desired by California customers. Project number 2: This is much more specialized, but also currently desired, to use extra solar energy, again only at the time it is generated (to save from any storage costs), to produce hydrogen for the burgeoning hydrogen power economy based primarily around LA but secondarily around San Francisco. If enough power is available, the potential is there to add additional hydrogen fueling stations for hydrogen powered vehicles to go to destinations rather than just local travel.
Covering water with solar panels will almost certainly have a negative effect on life under the surface, microbes, plankton and fish, we need to consider this carefully before installing large solar farms over water. On the contrary, installing solar panels above freeways would have a net positive effect, first of all there are plenty of freeways near where you want the power, and a solar roof above the freeway would allow EV's to turn of the aircon and use less power when the sun shines.
India also has massive amounts of terrains covered in mountains. As the ground rises the wind gains speed and temperature goes down. Wind in remote areas would be a pretty good option.
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Hi, I am of the view and understanding that the natural cycle of water will definately be impacted by inhabiting evaporation and keeping most of the water in the canals, please bear in mind that overall precipitation that actually irrigate natural and uncaltivated land depends on that evaporation which is kept for own agricultural purposes. The affects of this is extended draught in the natural wild where wild animals depends on precipitation.
I live in Southern California, and live less than a mile from the aqueduct, in the high desert. I think it would be a great idea to cover as much as they can, for all the reasons you discussed. We have solar farms, popping up everywhere. It ruins the fragile ecosystem of the desert, as well as unpleasant to see. I would much rather have it covering the water, that so many depend on. Thank you for the research that you shared!
lets say, regardless oh how it would be so, it ends up costing more then the land locked alternative. or even just more to run then it brings in. would it not still be worth it given the reduced water loss due to evaporation, and reduction of use of valuable land, all the while still providing a valuable source of clean green energy? would the cost of feeding more money into such then what you get out of it be a worth wile situation when those are the benefits? epically so in a places like California or India.
It's an interesting concept and probably worth pursuing in places like California that have canals running through largely desert environments or in artificial lakes created for hydroelectric. Of course, while you have existing infrastructure to connect to with the latter, that is largely absent in the former. The rate limiting step will still be energy storage and this has all the same limitations of land-based solar, such as intermittency, as he mentions. Ultimately the reason water availability is being squeezed in places like California and India isn't because of climate change but because of increased demand due to population growth and agriculture. Nevertheless it'll be interesting to see if it's a viable approach broadly or just in very niche outlets.
Or the record breaking heat each summer, cooking and killing food plants? Is that because of population growth and agriculture? Or something else? Hmmm? What could that be Dane Wigginton?
Whether anyone has checked the temperature beneath the Solar Panel when it is producing and delivering power? Do we heard about the internal resistance of solar panels? The surface below the panel when it is in operation normally becomes hot..
@UndecidedMF, Definitely an interesting video... But if you look at the current snow storm which dumped a ton of snow on the mountains in northern Cal... one would think that with good stewardship, your drought should be reduced or ending. Granted, its still too early to know because we're just getting started and we'll have to see how much more snow is going to be dumped .
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I could see a huge weed problem being eliminated at most of the I-75 on ramp ponds in Florida by using the ponds to float solar arrays for lighting along the ramps and maybe even fully lighting the whole length of the I-75 corridor through Florida. I can see the potential but until they invent self cleaning panels it's not a truly viable system if you're having to pay for the panels to be cleaned if that costs more than what you're saving in lost water revenue
Loved this episode! Trying Incogni through your link. Will let all know how it goes... I get so many junk emails and txt messages; I feel like somebody has it out for me and signing me up for this junk to mess with me!
I think that problem with those canals is that it will be very hard to keep them safe from theft or grief as survelliance will be nightmare for long instead of squared spaces.
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For theft, at least, there may be some benefit from the fact it’s over water and therefore it’s harder to find a good place to stand on/place equipment on to disconnect and recover the panels.
Let's see if I have this right... Solar panels over the aqueducts keeps the solar panels cooler so they perform better, cuts down on evaporation, produces electricity and doesn't take any useable land. With the initial expense being just 20 to 30 percent greater than placing a solar array on stands on the land I would say it is a win-win!
Great idea I had it about ten years ago. Also thought using highway medians and any type of easy accessible spaces to keep management easy. I also have the idea of sea water sprinklers (wind turbines) that also spray water to help water evaporate off the ocean. It would create cooler temperatures, generate energy for a turbines normal function. The water evaporates before it is back to water and create a hardier source of water for rain clouds to form. Maybe we can break the cycle of a drought. Turn it on when water is needed. Know need for desalination because salt won't evaporate. Brine falls back to ocean. Salt stays in the ocean and clouds carry fresh water inland and you can find suitable places and times to do it. In another ten years do that video can't wait. 😁
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I would add to the idea and make the canal a dome, similar material to what they make the new water pipe out of, I forget the name cross-linked polyethylene I think. That way any water that does evaporate collects on the surface and drips back down. Then cover that with solar panels. Concrete was an okay medium to transfer water, but it is dated, not that flexible, can/will crack and leak etc.. I don't know the logistics behind it or the economics but if people want to keep living... kind of need water. I don't know who makes these decisions or what but they need to get together and ask all the questions. Look at all the solutions. Put out a vote and get something going before its really to late.
I know solar windows are not nearly as effective although having tall buildings use them as their windows, at least where they would get a reasonable amount of sun, well that may cost more for construction although would reduce the long term cost of powering the building.
With acess to a cannal readily available like that, I would imagine a pumped hydro storage solution would be extremely practical if there is nearby elevation.
Wouldn't canal solar require more copper per MW? Unless it boosted voltages (and reduced I2R losses) at regular intervals to high voltage cables that also run along the canal.
I am from Gujarat, India . I have following Matt for more than a year now and I am very proud today to see him take inspiration from my homestate as most of his videos cover America and UK only .
For farmers that want to grow things under the panels (agrivoltaics), you would also save land. Also parking lots and roads. There might be fish farmers that would grow fish under floating panels. Lots of ways to multi-use with solar panels.
Water consumption in cleaning solar panels is an oft raised issue. Being able to rinse them with water you pump from the canal below feels like a win! As long as you're not using any chemicals, any dust/grime that gets washed off would have landed in the water if it hadn't landed on the solar panel so there's theoretically no issue with contamination. I'd be concerned about disturbing natural ecosystems, but there's plenty of man-made reservoirs and canals to go around. LA's reservoir uses these black plastic balls to reduce evaporation, using solar panels instead is obviously more complex but has the potential to add more value as well.
@AD Hunter I think considerations like this are why he said it is not a solution for all man made bodies of water. Although it may be possible to filter the water before using it to clean off the panels.
@Trap Johnson Right, that place. Now I think of it, why hasn't it been covered up already so the city can build parks and buildings over it? Might there just happen to be areas where one side is notably lower class than the other and some people don't want them to meet? As soon as I read your comment I have had this vision in my mind of some Darwin Award nominees climbing on the solar panels to spraypaint them and falling however far down... You can bet the news would not focus on how solar made the world a better place by lowering the number of idiots. There are certain PR issues with covering parts of a city with solar panels, and not just because the media tends to make big news of slightest problems. If we put them in a desert they give cool shade for plants and animals to thrive, but in a city they would have to be in somewhat open and sunny area to get most benefit, meaning they would likely shadow places that people left open and sunny on purpose. Big roads can be lit with LED lights and covering them from the rain might lower chances of accidents, but it is not a completely closed tunnel so some rain would still get in, LEDs break down all the time so maintenance costs would rise, and now there is a roof over the road so traffic control helicopters and drones just became useless. A canopy over pedestrian walkways protecting you from the rain and snow and midday heat sounds great... not so much if it darkens the alleys so much criminals can hide there to ambush you. Parking lots sound like the best place to cover in panels, but it needs to keep the lights on all the time to avoid traffic accidents and making a hideaway for criminals. Parks, of course, would be a nonstarter. Finally, even though there is "free" space in cities and you would save money on not needing to build long transmission lines, the buildings can shade the panels so much your ROI goes from two years to ten or twenty. Easy solution: Put the panel roof higher so fewer things can shadow it... So, yeah, solar is great tech that will help us a lot, but maybe we should avoid any projects that might create something like the Midgar slums...
@Jim (Chaim) Roberts It’s not the voltage but the power efficiency that goes down with covering. Every bit helps when you talk about large scale stuff.
Thank you. It's unbelievable that this kind of irrigation is prevalent in a cutting edge state as California (I know about it for years, it's not new for me). This is how the Soviet Union emptied the 4th largest lake in the world, the Aral sea. It's time for moving to sealed water pipes and drip irrigation...
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Try doing the math on how much more water you have to use for flooding, vs how much you might lose from using drip! For very hot climates like that, most of the water will end up evaporating, not in the aquifers - and when it eventually come back down as rain, it will probably be somewhere else, also not doing anything for the aquifers - at least not the locals ones you are using! Saving water will be better!
And what you do not seem to know is that flood irrigation helps to refresh the ground water aquifers. going to drip irrigation, etc has had a negative effect on the aquifers
I saw a solar farm over a retention pond. I thought it was a good idea. So much land here in Florida is used to preserve the water table and these solar farms could be a perfect adjunct
I have an question tho .. reducing the Evaporation an area what kind of effect will it have on the Weather ? clouds as such .. i doubt 1% of total can do much but things have effected weather with less.
I am surprised more Amazon or Ikea warehouses in PA, NJ and across the country do not have SOLAR on their roofs. Do you know why this is? Do corporations and TECH companies NOT want to seem like innovators???? I see them once in a while, but not on the scale that you would think IT SHOULD BE at this point.
Imagine doing this over the Colorado River? It would seem something like this should at least be analyzed and, if determined to be able to do all of the things mentioned in this video, it's a project that should be started right away.
Hi Matt, thanks for the video! That's a very interesting solution, and we need to start to find ways to optime our resources and go for really clean energy sources. Our crew recently filmed a very problematic situation happening in Europe. In the middle of the energy crisis, a lot has been said about wood pellets as a cleaner and more sustainable energy resource. But our findings were very controversial.
@Kevin Roll It is greener/cleaner than burning petroleum or coal. Petroleum and coal products release "new" CO2 to the atmosphere. Carbon / CO2 which has been sequestered under ground for millions of years. That sequestered Carbon reduced the atmospheric concentration of C02, contributing to global cooling hundreds of millions of years ago. The carbon released from burning pellets was taken from the atmosphere to grow the the tree, and returned upon burning. It is a short term "circular" economy. Nothing gained, nothing lost, net zero change over the lifecycle. Regardless, the CO2 from the wood pellets would have been returned to the atmosphere in relatively short time as the wood waste was decomposed. Burning wood pellets close to location wood was grown incurs relatively small transportation CO2 expense. Burning wood pellets that have been transported across an ocean has very little credibility as "green" fuel. It is "green washing".
I've seen mention of wood pellets too. If they are locally supplied, from "waste" wood, sure they may be reasonable. But I've seen suggestions of shipping pellets from North America to Europe. I can't see how that could be ecologically (CO2) viable.
Keeping water cool and liquid. People don't realize how fast water evaporates in the desert. It's almost more important than the 18GW that it would generate. This is something that will catch on only after water scarcity is taken seriously.
One of the best things about solar panels is their placement flexibility. They can go on all sorts of waste space (like covering canals, and parking lots, and roofs). The placement may not be as ideally efficient as a perfect solar farm location, but it should be enough to be cost-effective, while also solving other problems, such as canal/reservoir evaporation.
@Dave Stagner I agree CO2 is ONE of the primary causes. Land use change is the other. Again, not in dispute by anyone. The feedbacks are secondary to these other two, but much larger than the other 2 combined. These feedbacks are what drive the majority of climate change. For the most part, these feedbacks are educated guesses and "reasonable hypothesis" and not scientific facts, at least not at this point. Also, these are not "tipping points" that is something different, at least not as I understand what a tipping point is. The entire chain of efficiency is what matters. Though for fossil fuels, it's rather moot as whatever "energy subsidies" they get (like powering a refinery), they get from fossil fuels. If you think fossil fuel cars will stop being produced around 2040, you can expect fossil fuel cars on the road until at least 2060. But I believe this is EXTREMELY unlikely. EVs are already a good 25 thousand dollars more than ICE cars. That is likely to increase, not decrease. Lithium batteries are likely to get very expensive, very soon. The cost to charge them is likely to go up, but so is probably the price of gasoline, at least in the short to medium term. You said "But there’s a simple solution to that - replace coal and gas with renewables as rapidly as possible, which is exactly what the world is doing right now" But now we're back to the abysmal EROI of solar. Wind is better, but cannot be deployed as widely as solar and is not as cheap as solar. Your counterfactual about Germany is ridiculous. It's "heads I win, tails you lose" Germany's power is so high because of all the renewables, not in spite of all the renewables. Maybe today literally, but not in 2020. Not in 2021. Only 2022 and because of the war. Germany has had the highest electric prices in Europe (some of the highest in the world) for over a decade, long before the war troubles. Toyota is all in on hydrogen. I didn't say storing hydrogen or converting it to ammonia is "impossible" I said running western civ on solar and wind is impossible. And it is. People on your side of the argument have looked at this Canadian deal and it's crap from an energy point of view. Given the abysmal numbers, I'll be surprised if the project ever breaks even (in energy terms) after all of the energy expended is taken into consideration. Germany has plenty of wind. They should just sell them the windmills. Biofuels made from land based plant life are an absolute no starter. We should stop making ethanol from corn TODAY. A brand new study was just released on corn ethanol and it's probably negative energy wise. Engineering explained on youtube recently did a video on the study. Biofuels from sea weed and algae are much more promising and don't compete with farmland. Frankly, I don't think you understand or comprehend the enormous scale of the problem. We have 10s of trillions of Dollars worldwide invested in machinery/plant/equipment that need fossil fuels and will only run on fossil fuels or a biofuel equivalent.. Some of this equipment has very long lives. There is a ton of embedded energy in these machines. For a consumer example of embedded energy and how much it matters, if you want to be "green" buy an older car and run it into the ground (meaning drive it as long as humanly possible). This is MUCH "greener" (I hate that word because it means nothing) than buying a new electric car. The same is true with heavy equipment. Scrapping a 5 year old bulldozer to buy a new electric one (assuming such a thing existed) would give you the same dilemma. It's better to just keep the existing one. Why are you so hyper-focused on EVs and solar panels and wind? There are so many far less costly things we could be doing today to significantly reduce energy consumption/co2. We are doing none of these things. Everyone wants a magic fix where the status quo is maintained in almost every detail except we magically live on solar. Solar and wind particularly appeal to people because of their "back to nature" aesthetics. People like idyllic scenes of the country with windmills in the background. James Howard Kunstler (I highly recommend his blog) calls it "techno-narcissism" We're going run Walmart, Disney World and the interstate highway system on solar panels and windmills. This thinking has become common in everyone. I'm not just picking on environmentalists here.
@christo930 I do agree that we’ll see the last remnants of the ICE passenger vehicle industry through 2040, but the bullet is in the gut. Now it’s just a question of how long it takes the industry to bleed out. And I think we can come to at least an impasse on the causes of warming. I don’t disagree with your secondary sources (like loss of polar ice changing the albedo - that’s a “tipping point” effect), although I’ll note that polar ice changes and others are themselves a consequence of the warming initiated by CO2. And you agree that CO2 is the primary problem and must be addressed. So I don’t really think any of this is a real contention between us. If you want to count the entire chain of efficiency for EV energy, you need to do the same for ICEs (especially since you are noting, fairly, that carbon-based electricity is contributing to EV energy). But there’s a simple solution to that - replace coal and gas with renewables as rapidly as possible, which is exactly what the world is doing right now. And there are a lot of technophile EV owners that have put solar panels on their roofs and are mostly running their EVs that way, charging at home for all but long road trips. But even counting the entire energy chain and all inefficiencies, it’s beyond dispute that EVs are using much less energy than ICEs, and causing FAR less carbon emissions. You don’t disagree with that, either. Demanding 100% purity and perfection is neither practical nor fair. There must be a transition period, and we are in the midst of that transition, and will be for the next two or three decades. (By way of analogy… I’m trying to lose weight. But I didn’t get to just snap my fingers and instantly be at my goal weight. I’m halfway there, in a hard-fought transition to a new, healthy self. And it’s sometimes frustrating. But it doesn’t mean I can’t do it, or I shouldn’t be trying just because I haven’t yet succeeded.) So it seems to me our points of contention are down to implementation. You don’t think it’s possible to move entirely to EVs because there isn’t enough lithium in the world, AND you don’t believe that alternatives to lithium for EV use are possible. But even if there isn’t enough lithium for all purposes in the long run, there’s enough for now, and enough to get us through 2040 at least, and there’s strong motivation to recycle batteries to recover lithium. But more importantly, the prospect of sharp cost increases from lithium shortage is a strong motivator for alternative research. Major players like Toyota, BYD, NASA, and many other academic and commercial interests are working on sodium, solid-state sulfur/selenium, and other alternatives that can match or even beat lithium ion’s capacity and charge/discharge rates, using common and inexpensive materials. Even if lithium is always “best”, it won’t be “only”, and any tech that is “good enough” and far cheaper will always have a market. That’s why we don’t all drive Ferrari and Rolls-Royce, right? My Subaru is good enough and much cheaper. As for hydrogen… electrolysis is 60-70% efficient, so it’s not THAT bad, and some of the catalytic processes are hitting 90% now. And hydrogen factories can be built in remote areas far from urban centers that happen to have great wind or sun. The Canadian project you talked about is a good example, and a European consortium is building a large plant in Chile as well. Points about the difficulty of storing hydrogen are well taken, but it’s not impossible… just difficult. Converting to ammonia is an example. (This seems to be the root of our contention, too… when something is difficult, you see “impossible” and I see “possible”.) My main concern with hydrogen is that, even in my optimistic scenarios, it will still be more expensive than fossil natural gas. That puts it beyond the point where market forces alone can force the switch, and it will take government intervention. But I also think the political will to take such steps is rapidly growing - even more so since Russia exposed the world’s vulnerability to gas supplies in the hands of murderous dictatorships like Russia and Saudi Arabia. And this all comes down to cost, doesn’t it? Not efficiency. The market is your best friend or your worst enemy. When market forces alone want to do the right thing (like the current hard swing to wind/solar because they are now the cheapest raw electricity sources), great. But when they don’t, sometimes political force is required, and that will inevitably cost more, at least in the short run. That being said, I don’t think it’s fair to beat up on Germany’s energy prices right now, when they’d be in WORSE shape if they hadn’t put so much effort into domestic renewables (or worse, they’d be forced to cave to Russian belligerence). And California was a mess in terms of power costs and brownouts long before the shift to modern renewables… remember Enron and what California power markets were like 20 years ago? Other places, like my beloved home state of Minnesota, are transitioning rapidly to renewables without high prices or instability. And as grid storage catches up with the new renewable sources, stability will become the norm everywhere. And finally, biofuels… I’ve been advocating for biofuels since the 1990s, but I’ve actually become disenchanted with them lately. The problem, as you’d put it, is efficiency. The amount of land and water required to farm biofuel crops could be generating more power with direct PV solar, even with the cost of transformation to fuel factored in. I think we’re heading toward a world of tiered energy prices, trading price against immediate needs. The cheapest tier by far will be direct solar/wind, followed by short-term storage in batteries (etc). After that comes clean fuels - biofuels, hydrogen, other synthetic fuels. Nuclear will hang on if its base load nature can beat the long-term cost of the renewable/battery/synfuels system, or it’ll fade away if it can’t match the new prices. Fossil fuels will have to be killed off in the end by political action - anything from carbon taxes to outright bans. But look at the angry kids out there slashing tires on SUVs today, and remember that in twenty years, they’re going to be winning elections. I wouldn’t be surprised to see many fossil fuel systems actively outlawed through most of the world by 2050.
@Dave Stagner NO. An EV moves much of its inefficiency somewhere else and not measured in these MPGe ratings.(most of the losses occurred before the electricity got into the battery to recondition("recharge") it) We are talking thermal efficiency. Unless an EV is being powered with solar or wind, the efficiency drops precipitously. There are (large) losses at the generator, there are losses in the grid, there are losses in the charging and discharging. They are more efficient than a gasoline burning car, but nowhere near what these MPG numbers would make you think. Your "facts" leave out this important part of the overall efficiency of an EV. How convenient that you start at the battery and not at the source of energy. We ain't got no hydrogen. Hydrogen would be a great fuel in some ways if we actually had some, but we don't. It has to made. So far, almost all hydrogen is made by steam retort. You burn a bunch of natural gas to heat water to steam, then you use that steam on other natural gas and strip away the hydrogen. The electrolysis method is extremely inefficient. The new method requires catalysts and is also fairly inefficient, though nowhere near as inefficient as regular electrolysis. Japan is on the verge of something called "red hydrogen" (IIRC) which could be a game changer for hydrogen. Storing hydrogen is difficult and expensive. Even this Canadian project I was telling you about is converting the hydrogen into ammonia to try and avoid the difficulty and expense of liquid hydrogen or highly compressed hydrogen. Oil derived from algae or seaweed or something is a much better fuel. It is compatible with the trillions in capital equipment we already have and would have to be scrapped. I am not aware of anyone proposing to use nuclear for load matching. Nuclear is base load. Without base load, we don't have a grid, we have chaos. Again, I point you to locales and countries with very high renewables. They have high prices, some of the highest in the world. Everyone loves pointing at Germany's renewables, but not their rates. I told you what the other contributors were, land use and feedback mechanisms. 3/4s of a degree C is what the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere from pre-industrial levels would do and is doing. Have you ever heard of the urban heat island effect? It's very large. It can produce a 10 degree F temperature difference in the city compared to the outlaying areas around that city. All the black roofs and paved surfaces heat up and radiate that heat into the area. Waste heat from heat engines in cities. Probably smog plays a role at night keeping the heat from escaping. Forests do not heat up nearly as much as say farmland. Farm lands do not heat up nearly as much as paved surfaces. Land change use is a major contributor to global warming. This is not in dispute. According to google, it's 23% of global warming. That is almost a 1/4 of the warming. But the really big contributor is feedback loops. I gave you the most cited example of dark oceans replacing highly reflective ice in the polar regions. Again, this is not in dispute. NOBODY disputes this. None of these are out of the mainstream. There is not one mainstream climate scientist would tell you land usage and feedback loops are not primary global warming causes. Of course, this would also include co2. When I cite these things, it is I not you (denying these things) who are in the mainstream of climate science. I do not oppose taking steps to prevent climate change. As for insurance, would you take out an insurance policy with an insolvent insurance issuer? If we're going to bet the farm on something, I want to chose something with a very high likelihood of working. AND, 1/2 measures are useless. At best, they buy time. But that is all 1/2 measures can do. We need to ELIMINATE not reduce CO2. But right now, we don't have that ability. Worst, we refuse to do the little things that would buy a lot more time. Covid's work from home policy caused an enormous global reduction in co2 (though it wasn't the only thing). We have abandoned that model already. In the US, I would venture to guess 25% or more of all workers could work from home all or most of the time. We grow cotton in the US and put it on container ships to Asia where that cotton is processed and knitted into t-shirts and socks, put back on a giant boat and shipped to America. We are powerless (seemingly) to reverse this silly concept. We fly fresh vegetables in from Vietnam, vegetables that grow here with no problem. We literally import bottled water from Asia. Outside a few major commodities, we recycle almost nothing. There is no infrastructure set up to deal with trying to recycle all these batteries. The world is not even close to ready to displace the ICE engine. More and more is coming out how there is no possible way to increase lithium, cobalt and nickel at a fast enough rate to meet the supposed goals of banning ICE cars by 2032. Various auto-makers are rapidly improving the thermal efficiency of the ICE. Even if everything goes as smoothly as possible, the ICE powered passenger vehicle will be with us to at least 2040, IMHO.
@christo930 Ok, in that case, I’ll try. Let’s start with relative efficiency of EVs. There’s actually a government-approved measurement for this - MPGe, or MPG equivalent. (Please, don’t fall onto that “the government is corrupt” nonsense.) A Tesla 3 is rated for 132 MPGe. This is not out of line with other standard EVs, which are in the 120-135 MPGe range (120 for larger models like the Tesla S or Lucid Air, or less well made models like the Chevy Bolt). The Bolt is comparable to the Chevy Spark at 33 MPG, so about 4x better. Tesla S compares to a BMW 7 Series at 27 MPG, so more than 4x. Not surprising, since even the longest-range EVs with the largest batteries carry the energy equivalent of only three gallons of gasoline. You can believe the government, or you can believe simple arithmetic, or you can believe your own preconceptions. All I can do is tell you the facts. What matters isn’t theoretical efficiency in ideal conditions. What matters is working mileage on the road. So we don’t need NEARLY as much electricity to operate vehicles as we do gasoline, in terms of total energy. As for hydrogen… I think green hydrogen is an important solution for the future, not because it’s efficient (it’s not), but because it’s a FUEL, and has the advantages of a fuel. It can be stored indefinitely at high density, and it’s portable. You can make it in one place and ship it to another. It can be used in modified gas peaker power plants, so they can do what they already do - provide grid demand management. Except instead of balancing demand against inflexible base load coal/nuclear plants that can’t easily scale up or down, it can balance against the variability of solar/wind. Which gets to a key problem… matching grid supply to grid demand, which varies over the course of a day, by weather and season and other things, usually over 50% over the course of a day. This is something the nuclear-only people don’t understand - nuclear has the same problem as renewables for matching demand, but from the opposite direction. Rather than variability, nuclear is invariable. It works on the current grid because fossil-powered gas peaker plants provide demand responsiveness - at great cost. A mostly nuclear grid will need storage for load balancing as much as a mostly renewable grid. And into that gap falls the expensive but workable nature of grid storage - batteries, thermal, hydrogen, etc. And we’ll probably need a variety of solutions to match a variety of circumstances. Finally, I want to address your soft-pedaled rejection of mainstream thinking on the role of anthropogenic CO2 in global warming. I know you really really want to believe that it’s not just CO2, but… what if it is? What if the vast majority of climate scientists are, in fact, right? And what if they’re right about tipping points we’re facing, such as the loss of the polar ice cap, Greenland ice, and large parts of the Antarctic ice? What if they’re right about melting of the permafrost suddenly releasing massive amounts of methane? If you own a home, you have insurance… not because you think your house will burn down (it’s very unlikely), but because you know it CAN. We can’t just let civilization itself hang in the balance of our faith in a best case scenario that few actual experts believe in, no matter how comforting that faith may feel. We don’t have the luxury of forcing the scientists to prove they’re right by experience before acting on their warnings. It’ll be too late then, just like you can’t get insurance after your house has already burned down.
@TheAnnoyingBoss not the kind of data I was looking for, I was look at information similar Americans loosing 824 million IQ points due to leaded fuel, damaging the capabilities of the country substantially, or cfc's shredding the ozone, causing far high skin cancer rates in those south of the equator than there otherwise would have been. What you see doesn't tell the full story.
Bro a lot of the water they're putting this stuff on is man made. The atmosphere can handle changes in moisture levels. I live in a desert high up and the air is thin and the plants are alive. My blood as all the oxygen it needs. The animals are alive. The bushes grow. I get on a plane and go down lower by a lake and the air is thick with water you feel like you can chew it and everything is still alive bro. That's all I'm saying. You're worrying too much. The ocean is most of the earth bro. I think we should think a lot about that because that says a lot about the space we have available to us to do things. I just wonder, what is some things we should make that sit inside the ocean and what will they do.
Solar panel above canals and reservoirs make sense. But, solving climate change relies too often on technology, whilst human behaviour is absolved. Generally, US residents are wasteful with resources and consider this to be an scriptable part of their way of life, if not their immuable right. California's residential water consumption is set legally at a maximum 208 liters (55 US gallons) per person per day. In actually, far more is used: back in May 2022, daily consumption peaked at 291 liters. In the UK, actual consumption is 142 liters per person per day, or less than half that of California's. Being less wasteful would help Californians a lot, although I don't see how a self-centered and entitled culture hell-bent of the right to do anything one wants with little care for consequences can change sufficiently to reduce waste. I anticipate already comments about 80% of water in California being used for agriculture, thus diverting the blame away from personal use. Don't worry: I have thoughts on that too, other than the obvious, but yet so evident, "every little helps", which so many of us fail to apply.
I lived in Tempe AZ for a few years. They have lots of man made canals in the area. This is one of the hottest and driest areas in the world and they just made canals that slowly moving water that sits in dry and hot air. This seems the perfect solution to two problems plus the benefits of more solar power then could be possible without the cooling effect of the water under the solar panels. I have had solar on my home for over 10 years now. Nothing produces more power then a sunny 55-60 degree day. Very exciting.
It's an obvious win for California. The California Aqueduct and the larger side canals are quite literally a perfect fit. Not too narrow, not too wide... just right. Runs most of the length of the state and evaporation is a big issue. Also runs through the central valley which is flat and wide-open, so no trees on the sides, and is near transmission line infrastructure in many places along the route. You can't ask for much more than that!
Finally this is a sensible idea. Few years ago I was pretty surprised to see, that they put the solar farms into the fields and then move the vegetable growing on top of houses and high-rise buildings. The next idea was to put the solar panels under the roads. Panels over canals make sense, just like how putting solar panels above parking lots. A few malls already did that around me, and it's great.
Smaller scale first. Photo Voltaics over Electrical Vehicle Charging Stations. The infrastructure already exists and production of current EV’s can meet the demand easily. Shaded cars use less AC, cooler cars/cooler batteries have longer service lives, and much of the power losses due transmission to distance can be ignored because the power is used locally. And of course excess gets fed back into the grid.
0:02 - wait...how drought records have started for the Western US 1200 years ago when the western world had not arrived on the continent until only 400 (give or take) years ago? 🙂 Also, I think "phlotovoltaics" is slightly funnier than "floatovoltaics".
can you please make a video about the end of a solar panel. we have so many sitting in warehouses in Melbourne Australia because they can't recycle them.
OMG look at you! I remember finding your Clip-Share thinking 'how is it possible this guy has so few subscribers'. Figured it would come cuz the vids were top shelf. Look how many subs you have NOW. PROPS
Hmm the issue I’ve read is Cali isn’t filling their lakes. Sending water to save an extinct fish in the bay seems like a huge problem leading to wasted water. They measure the salt in the bay but some are speculating the salt isn’t from the ocean but potentially some of the readings could be from pollution leaking into the bay. One problem I’ve seen is recycling. Can they or will they recycle the silver from solar panels? If they don’t then solar panels are as dirty and polluting as fossil fuels considering how much environmental damage went into getting those metals.
I'm sure people have thought of this but I didn't hear it addressed in this. As great as the water savings would be to have, how would the reduced evaporation from this end up affecting the water cycle as a whole? In the case of covering all the canals in this way, would that do anything overall to the amount of rainfall a year?
There are quite a few things I worry about with this "solution", now while I agree that this seems like a viable alternative to solar farm when placed upon locations such as, irrigation canals and waste treatment pools or otherwise brackish hostile water features. I vehemently disagree with putting them atop water sources such as lakes or reservoirs, those places are quite often used by both people and wildlife alike, take Lake Mead for example boating and fishing are quite popular there, not only will those panels be a serious boating hazard but how will they impact the ecosystem of the fish? Not to mention even if they were to be installed there they would likely do next to nothing regarding the evaporation and consumption issue of the water, to me it seems more like a fever dream for the renewable cultists more than anything. Now onto the cost issue for one who is gonna be paying for this? the federal govt? the state govt? private investors? the farmers? With the extensive canal system California has it is by no means going to be cheap, especially for a state that has one of highest tax ratios in the nation, if the goal is to mitigate evaporation loss than a simple tin or tarp cover can achieve the same effect minus the power generation at a fraction of the installation cost, then there is also the maintenance costs to considered who is going to be paying for that? How frequent will it have to be? How many man hours will it take? How many employees will be needed? etc. Again this seems like a bunch or renewable nerds hyper focusing on one issue while ignoring everything else that goes along with it, not to mention if power is the main problem then we have had the solution for that for the better part of a century... nuclear power it takes up a fraction of the land renewables do while pumping out far more power and its just as clean when all factors are considered, heck I lived within 5 miles of one for a good chunk of my life and are no worse off from it nor was the environment in fact the wildlife boomed in the area surrounding it. While on the flip side I've seen wind turbines for example murder birds on the daily and nearly kill about a dozen people when one of the blades broke off. While this solar option was likely a good move for India due to their excessive worker pool, low labor costs and less diversified energy production, those same factors do not apply in California's case.
@TheAnnoyingBoss I wasn't referring to fusion but fission plants which pump out around 1,700 MW on average with the largest among them putting out over 7,000 MW, far more so than any renewable source has done aside from hydro but you can only make a very finite number of dams. And fusion is absolutely nowhere near that by any stretch of the imagination as we still can barely understand or replicate it however, we understand fission quite well and have been using for the better part of a century to power things from homes to aircraft carries, heck France has been powering 70% of their country with it alone and its still one of the cleanest and safest energy sources we got. The energy conundrum is a difficult question to tackle, but I don't see being wholly dependent on renewables as the way forward there is to many drawbacks to them as they stand now, ideally with the current tech available our best option is a 80-90% nuclear and a 10-20% renewable grid, with the investments going into SMR's as well nuclear plants will be far easier to place in locations that would otherwise be difficult for larger fission plants.
Nuclear sucks bro. These morons come out talking about fusion where they used a whole bunch of space to put 2 megawatts in and get 3 out and they got bills to pay for being at a +33% power production rate. That's nuclear bro 😂 you ask how many alarms are going off they tell you probably 10. There's gotta be a better way bro. I've been thinking about it a lot and it's hard.
the way this guy talks makes it seems like these things aren't all gimmicks, but I have yet to see him talk about something practical and useable in the actual world
I often say "We need to implement any solution to mitigate our changing climate problems ... optimize costs later when we can catch our breath". Just saying. And combined with Matt's info presented here, there's positive side effects to be had.
I really like your videos, thank you! As a SI unit user, thank you for having the conversions on screen. However if the source value is rounded the converted value should also be rounded. For example 90,000 acres is not 36,421.71 hectares but 36,000 hectares. And in that case more logical unit would be square kilometers.
There should definitely be some sort of cover for irrigation canals to prevent water loss, with or without the solar bonus it needs to be done, that process should plan with future solar in mind, build the covers using the same or a compatible construction method for the agro voltaics
This concept was first seen in China where FVs were installed over an exhausted open pit coal mine which was substantially flooded. REF:clip-share.net/video/uCSGw6TsEhU/video.html
Photovoltaic is great, except they have reached in many places and EXCESS of daily power. Ask California. They have, for the past few years sold power in excess generation from solar, but other states, Arizona and Nevada don't buy it much since they too have lots of solar power. In at least 1 year, California PAID Arizong to take their excess power while several plants were idle. The issue is at night. Wind does NOT provide anything close to a constant level of power. We won't ever have enough batter storage to run all night. While this idea is good for retaining water, you also have to weigh in what happens during heavy winds and the ability to do work on the system easily. Canals are the way to go, floating in settlement ponds, cooling ponds, sewer treatment ponds etc are better, because when you start putting them in reservoirs that are used it will meet opposition.
If you build a few desalination plant, you can run them on excess power you otherwise have to pay other states to take it. That solves two problem in one go.
Hi, am I right in thinking most of these (apparently long) canals feed various other areas. If so does this mean there is a drop in elevation along the canals? Should this be the case, could wears be built along these canals at regular intervals and host the introduction of turbine systems to produce electricity along with the photovoltaic panels. From previous videos Matt, there would only require a fall of 3metres to operate said turbines. This would help reduce running costs of the panels and give more incentive to implement these technologies.
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Great videos Matt! Love the potential behind this one! Anyone else see the irony in paying a company to unhook you from other companies that may or may not have sold your info online without your consent? Also, paying for this service doesn't actually save you from leaks, because that's just info that is OUT THERE now, nothing to be done about it but change passwords to affected accounts...
Floating solar can reduce local weather change arround water reseroir. No more fog arround.. Balancing photovoltaic and hydro make reliable power generation. It will reduce algar growth in irrigation water too.
I’ve been saying that covering the canal running through the high desert in California would save a bunch of water and using solar panels could power the lift pumps easily. Converting the spillway around Glendale to a pipe and using the head pressure to generate electricity too
in france they even monted vertical double sided solar panels oriented east west along the water canals to provide electricity in the morning and evening when horizontal panel mounted on the water canal were not so eficient. in that way they took advantage of the electricity grid already installed for the horizontal panels
This definitely feels like something we should get good at doing. Even if isn't the one-stop fix that it sounds like it could be, it seems like something we should have in the mix. I'm curious if any of these installations need to provide boat access? Or do they just target canals that don't use boats?
@David Reyes Gonzalez Aragon Depends. A foot of I-beam costs about $10 for materials, you might have about 300 support posts per mile, so the cost of raising the roof by 10' would be few tens of thousands per mile. The panels alone would cost couple million dollars per mile, without counting the framework or the installation costs. And a lot of canals seem to lack access roads along their full length, so using barges would save the cost of building those. If we can get those savings for only 1% of the budget it seems like a rather good deal. However, the original plan was to keep the panels cool and shade the canal, and raising the panels too high would probably cause problems for those functions. And while it seems obvious to use a boat for working on a canal, the boat would obviously be under the panels while the workers would need access to the top side. So maybe that part of the idea is a bust anyway... But unless my estimates are wildly wrong, the cost should not be an issue.
@AnalystPrime It makes sense for easier repairng but then the added cost for elevating the structure could place the viability of the project in question. Maybe boats are not needed and just drone usage for inspections + cranes for actual maintance works could do the trick. It definitely sounds like a great alternative within the Solar energy field.
@NYFB Productions Oh, the boats would fit just fine under a low ceiling. The people crouching in them who would complain to OSHA for bad working conditions, not so much. And the boat might have a crane or other equipment installed for getting at the panels. Also, the canal itself may need bigger boats for dredging or other maintenance. The issue here is that many canals do not have a handy road next to them, so either we need to allow for boats that carry whatever machinery is needed for repairing and eventually replacing the panels*, or build access roads on both sides so construction equipment can access the whole length of it. *:Oh, yeah, given there would be thousands, possibly 10000+ solar panels per mile, and maybe hundreds of miles of canals, we will also want to carry the new panels in and old panels out on boats, which use far less fuel than cars.
@AnalystPrime Given the width and depth on most irrigation canals, I would imagine most boats used for maintenance are low profile flat-bottomed dinghies. I've seen people squeeze those under 2-3 foot tall bridges with minimal issues, so it's something that should be accounted for, but I don't think it will be a serious concern.
@Fire Angel One negative to that application is the increased heat found in heavily built up urban areas or just from the surface of a concrete or asphalt roadway. Solar panels loose efficiency with higher temperature. It would work but wouldn't be as efficient as the water based solution proposed here.
Great video Matt. This makes total sense in a country like Australia. We allegedly have 16000 Sq kms of water catchements and the 4th highest water use in the OECD. Would be keen to know the impact to aquatic life.
I wouldn't say this would SOLVE the drought issue, but it absolutely CAN help reduce water loss. My daughter-in-law lives in Antelope Valley north of Los Angeles, where a significant length of the California Aqueduct that feeds water to L.A. traverses. It has ALWAYS mystified me why they never tried to cover the Aqueduct in any fashion, because it is obvious to any and all that evaporation losses of uncovered water in a desert valley with nearly year-round high winds is an enormous waste.
as someone who watch my generated power on graph it hurts my eyes to see how many of that instalations had obsticles to cast shadows, if you don't have expensive optimisers on each panel it massively decrease your power yealds just from small shadow ower one cell in series most of this gigant instalations is just kind of greenwashing and wasting taxpayers money if not done propperly
I'm more interested in the potential for floating solar. Since you can use simpler dual-axis tracking systems, you can generate far more power , while avoiding the duck-tail effect of fixed solar. Also, gravity dams can act as fast-acting energy storage.
Matt, the more I watch your content the closer I come to the decision that renewable energy will not be practical. Every discussion about renewable energy results in an expensive impractical solution that proves time and time again that renewable energy is a luxury, but not a sustainable solution.
I wonder if something similar to Fog nets could be placed between the panel and the canal since the structure to support the solar panels will also support the fog net or gels or such could be placed since above the water has a higher humidity. dont know if it is feasible but any way to save more water using the structures built for other green projects would help
Do you think solutions like solar canals are a good idea? The first 100 people to use code UNDECIDED at the link below will get 20% off of Incogni: incogni.com/undecided.
Corrections: 07:42 - Should read 238 billion liters, not million
If you liked this video, check out Solar Panels Plus Farming? Agrivoltaics Explained clip-share.net/video/lgZBlD-TCFE/video.html
@Thunderstormworld Stupid is as stupid does. And, all their waterways are toxic, they don't have the envirinmental protection laws that California has, that Pres Bush Sr put into place.
Chinese have put PV panels on water for years now, not new at all.
@Michael Mayhem Chinese have put PV panels on water for years now, not new at all.
Chinese have put PV panels on water for years now, not new at all.
California is not capable to do this project and in 50% what Gujrat did, better forget it !
Just like Agrovoltaics combining two things to be greater than either single thing alone sounds like a huge win to me. It will be great to see more of these installations in the future.
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I saw the thumbnail and that's exactly what it reminded me of.
Also massive home rooftop solar panels, instead of over reliance on extremely expensive and time consuming transmission lines from huge solar and wind farms even though they have their place as well, but we would need less of them.
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@M33f3r Depends, you have agrovoltaic installations that are build higher to allow tractor access underneath (It think the testproject in Germany did this), ofcourse this is more costly, but it is something you can look at.
From what I understand the biggest downside is the fact they can’t use tractors but I might be wrong on that.
This is genius. I go out of my way to buy things that have duel purposes, I've always lived this way. I recycle where ever I can and I reuse what other people would call trash. I make furniture out of cardboard boxes and throw very little away. That's why I say, this is genius. Keep at it guys, you'll get it completely right.
Use a pivot arm to pull panels out of the canal for repair work and for cleaning the canal.
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Great idea. I wonder how much water would be saved as it slows down evaporation and save more water? I live in the South end of the San Joaquin Valley in California and the draught has had major consequences on the population. A few years ago the wells on the East side of town dried up. There was no drinking water and the area had to have water containers put in peoples yards and they had to use public showers for bathing.
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CA once had enough reservoirs but nothing has been built since the population doubled. Droughts will happen and that why you build reservoirs.
@ISuckAt GuitarAndBass42 I like comments like this. This is not a one solution issue. Its going to take a multitude of changes and implementations and ideas of all kinds. We need solar, we need wind, we need hydro, we need geothermal, we could really use more nuclear but everyone is so afraid.
@ISuckAt GuitarAndBass42 yeah I didn’t say it would be. Considering that the amount of water falling on the state doesn’t really change, a 10% bump would be huge. My worry is that instead of changing water use people just go back to normal.
Dear Matt Ferrell,
I admire your videos and look forward to every new video.
I am a chemistry teacher, and I love to explain some of my lectures through videos to make complex ideas easy, perceptible and funny for my students.
Please, could I ask with what programm/softaware do you make your videos?
I am looking forward to your response!
Many thanks in advance!
PS: Any help/suggestions from other readers are much appreciated!
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I am curious to know if this will have an impact in the following two areas:
1. The cloud formation and hence the rain, since covering these water bodies would mean lesser evaporation.
2. The general temperature in the nearby areas since the breeze from water bodies is a major factor in determining the temperature that is felt on the nearby land areas.
Do we have studies/calculations for educating us for these two impacts?
@Steve if you knew about the natural environments they were abundant in water
Mere paas dono question ka ans hai bhai 1. Only nehar par solar penal lagege us se kuch nahi hoga 0.0000000001% ka fark aayega kyu ki nehar se pani kheto me jaa kar bhaap ban ke ud jayegaa
2. Temprature me bhi koi bhi fark nahi aayega kyu ki nehar se koi bhi temprature me utar chadav nahi hoti hai jab tak nehar kaa pani kheto, nadiyo, uskhi pade nalo, jhilo, or kheto tak nahi pahuchta bhai me kisaan hu me 10 saalo se kisani kar raha hu jab bhi hum apne kheto me pani dete hai (hum matlab 2 4 km ke area ke kisaan jo sam ek saath boni karte hai or ek saath pani dete hai ) to temprature me 5°se 7° degree Celsius kam ho jata hai. 🙏🙏🙏👍👍👍
These are narrow, man made aqueducts. Any added moisture in those areas are not natural so limiting it will only help restore the local area back to its natural state.
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Exactly, I think ultimately the local environment will get drier without evaporation, and end up needing more water as there's less in the environment
Sounds like a great idea especially if the long term benefits of reducing the water lost to evaporation and the impact this could have decades from now
Hey Matt, Question I see a lot of your video's like this that have grand Ideas about using Solar panels to help fix the worlds energy/environmental crisis. My question is, what kind of impact would it have environmentally to create all of the solar panels for some of these well intentioned and possibly ground breaking and world changing projects?
@Jf aamand I don't expect him to get super deep into it... And I enjoy his videos for what they are... High level overviews if proposals and ideas. For me it's a good way to get a lot of information about a subject without needing to know the nitty gritty details. My question was more directed at a possibility of a video that maybe addresses the idea that there are some of these over arching issues with some of the purposes ideas and maybe there are companies or tech that are looking to solve those huge issues.
Matt is not a scientific guy. Dont expect anything from him other than his own personal opinion. But if you look up how solar panels are created and assume you would use them en masse like Matt suggests in his videos it would surely be an environmental disaster.
He makes good money from youtube so i dont expect him to make any change to his half-baked format anytime soon
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These ideas, integrating and dual functions is clearly the way to go. Solar panels capacity to shade and cool what is below makes a huge amount of sense.
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I'm trying to think of ways to get sun to the dark side of the earth without making it day time for everyone 24/7. Only way I can think to do it is to shoot a lazerbeam all the way around earth which I don't even think it possible. Probably get almost no energy by the time you get to the dark side. We got all these solar panels doing NOTHING at night time. That's a tough problem to fix if it's impossible to just easily bounce a lazerbeam onto mirrors in space all the way around to the dark side
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Every time I have driven between San Francisco and LA on I5 I have wondered why the irrigation canals aren’t covered… and why they aren’t covered by solar panels. It just seems like a good idea and I’m glad to hear that it may become a reality!
@Mitchel R******** -giggles- Thank you. You actually made me laugh out loud. Have a great day. :D
@acflory "Climate Change" has been on-going for 4.57bn years. You Communists wont stop it from changing no matter how much Communism you try. Who again are the Climate Changing Deniers?
George Washington was shooting Redcoats because of an over-priced stamp. What would George be doing to Communists today is what you Commie/Fascists should be asking yourselves.
Open irrigation channels were a cheap option back when we didn't know/didn't care about climate change. They've now become a luxury we can no longer afford.
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Yea because others people money just flows like mana from heaven onto Govt employees. Why dont you move to China where the CCP runs things?
Interesting. I wonder what sort of knock-on effects this would have though; less water being evaporated (maybe less rainfall?), and less sunlight reaching the ecosystem in the water below.
Ahhh, i remember reading about this in Indian state of Gujarat. It was supposedly the idea of current PM of India who was CM of Gujarat at that time some 15yrs ago. Its a very cool method. It prevents water from evaporating during summer & water helps improve efficiency of Solar Panels by cooling it down.
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Sure, installing panels over a canal might be more expensive, and the cost saved on water might not be worth the power generated, but you save huge upfront on land acquisition, clearing and right of way costs. And in a place like India where land acquisition is a challenging task since farmers are unwilling to give away their lands, these projects bring in more benefit in the form of more water and power to irrigate lands, power companies and of course for the environment. Also, it's good for food security and energy security of a country that doesn't have any meaningful oil/gas reserves or even any transitional form of energy until renewables technology catches up to scale. Like you said, win, win, win. Only concern still is the eco-friendly manufacturing of solar panels, access to rare earths. Coming to maintenance the automated systems are already available and seems like a good bet.
Coming to floating photovoltaics I feel like the power generated can be used with a pumped storage type hydropower system where we use solar to pump the water and use as potential energy or battery, avoids using battery storage altogether which requires rare earths to manufacture, of course might not work for all plants and geographies. But every bit helps the planet. Drops can make an Ocean.
Covering the aqueduct has been proposed ad infinitum, whether just a cover or solar panels. Using large pipeline vs open channels was considered in the 50's. Open channel was just easier to inspect and repair. A cover, solar panels above or floating on the aqueduct has numerous issues. Since there are numerous check structures, turnouts, pumping plants, and if "debris" (ie, cover material and solar panels break up) are in the water, more time will be needed to shut down the water flow, disrupting deliveries, to clean out debris. Especially when there is a break in the channel. Disruption to deliveries has to be absolutely minimized. There have been other suggestions regarding placing small hydrogenators throughout the length of the aqueduct. Reducing the energy of the flow (increasing friction thereby increasing water elevation.... see Bernoulli's equation) was not viable.
India started doing this a fee years ago with some success...my belief with renewable has always been how to use it over existing infrastructure. I understand that at times the only options is massive solar farms, it still hurts to watch useful recently active farm land get plowed over and turned into a solar farm because that makes more money then food production. This is a good idea in my book just needs to be implemented correctly.
thanks for this. Specifically your research and insight and the platform that you've built. Two likes!
I appreciate your balanced reporting of the pros/cons.
If this would be implemented there hopefully a program for recycling the solar panels would be implemented at the same time. Currently most solar panels just go straight to the landfill which would take forever to break down considering the materials they are made with.
Since California desperately needs to save every drop of water possible, a potential savings of 82% of evaporation is potentially huge. Depends upon how much canal is covered. If not that much power is required, perhaps they go ahead and cover additional canal anyways, then they have more power than customers require for a couple of potential projects.
Project number 1: Use extra solar energy, only at the time it is generated (to save from any storage costs), to use for desalination plants to produce some of the additional water desired by California customers.
Project number 2: This is much more specialized, but also currently desired, to use extra solar energy, again only at the time it is generated (to save from any storage costs), to produce hydrogen for the burgeoning hydrogen power economy based primarily around LA but secondarily around San Francisco. If enough power is available, the potential is there to add additional hydrogen fueling stations for hydrogen powered vehicles to go to destinations rather than just local travel.
Covering water with solar panels will almost certainly have a negative effect on life under the surface, microbes, plankton and fish, we need to consider this carefully before installing large solar farms over water.
On the contrary, installing solar panels above freeways would have a net positive effect, first of all there are plenty of freeways near where you want the power, and a solar roof above the freeway would allow EV's to turn of the aircon and use less power when the sun shines.
India also has massive amounts of terrains covered in mountains. As the ground rises the wind gains speed and temperature goes down. Wind in remote areas would be a pretty good option.
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Hi, I am of the view and understanding that the natural cycle of water will definately be impacted by inhabiting evaporation and keeping most of the water in the canals, please bear in mind that overall precipitation that actually irrigate natural and uncaltivated land depends on that evaporation which is kept for own agricultural purposes. The affects of this is extended draught in the natural wild where wild animals depends on precipitation.
I live in Southern California, and live less than a mile from the aqueduct, in the high desert. I think it would be a great idea to cover as much as they can, for all the reasons you discussed.
We have solar farms, popping up everywhere. It ruins the fragile ecosystem of the desert, as well as unpleasant to see. I would much rather have it covering the water, that so many depend on. Thank you for the research that you shared!
lets say, regardless oh how it would be so, it ends up costing more then the land locked alternative. or even just more to run then it brings in. would it not still be worth it given the reduced water loss due to evaporation, and reduction of use of valuable land, all the while still providing a valuable source of clean green energy? would the cost of feeding more money into such then what you get out of it be a worth wile situation when those are the benefits? epically so in a places like California or India.
What happens to the solar panel when the canal floods? What about the debris flow when the solar panels are washed downstream?
It's an interesting concept and probably worth pursuing in places like California that have canals running through largely desert environments or in artificial lakes created for hydroelectric. Of course, while you have existing infrastructure to connect to with the latter, that is largely absent in the former. The rate limiting step will still be energy storage and this has all the same limitations of land-based solar, such as intermittency, as he mentions. Ultimately the reason water availability is being squeezed in places like California and India isn't because of climate change but because of increased demand due to population growth and agriculture. Nevertheless it'll be interesting to see if it's a viable approach broadly or just in very niche outlets.
Or the record breaking heat each summer, cooking and killing food plants? Is that because of population growth and agriculture? Or something else? Hmmm? What could that be Dane Wigginton?
What about the mega droughts in California?
Whether anyone has checked the temperature beneath the Solar Panel when it is producing and delivering power? Do we heard about the internal resistance of solar panels? The surface below the panel when it is in operation normally becomes hot..
@UndecidedMF,
Definitely an interesting video...
But if you look at the current snow storm which dumped a ton of snow on the mountains in northern Cal... one would think that with good stewardship, your drought should be reduced or ending. Granted, its still too early to know because we're just getting started and we'll have to see how much more snow is going to be dumped .
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I could see a huge weed problem being eliminated at most of the I-75 on ramp ponds in Florida by using the ponds to float solar arrays for lighting along the ramps and maybe even fully lighting the whole length of the I-75 corridor through Florida. I can see the potential but until they invent self cleaning panels it's not a truly viable system if you're having to pay for the panels to be cleaned if that costs more than what you're saving in lost water revenue
Loved this episode!
Trying Incogni through your link. Will let all know how it goes... I get so many junk emails and txt messages; I feel like somebody has it out for me and signing me up for this junk to mess with me!
I think that problem with those canals is that it will be very hard to keep them safe from theft or grief as survelliance will be nightmare for long instead of squared spaces.
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Yeah bro it is California after all
For theft, at least, there may be some benefit from the fact it’s over water and therefore it’s harder to find a good place to stand on/place equipment on to disconnect and recover the panels.
Let's see if I have this right... Solar panels over the aqueducts keeps the solar panels cooler so they perform better, cuts down on evaporation, produces electricity and doesn't take any useable land. With the initial expense being just 20 to 30 percent greater than placing a solar array on stands on the land I would say it is a win-win!
Wouldn't reducing evaporation reduce clouds too?
Great idea I had it about ten years ago. Also thought using highway medians and any type of easy accessible spaces to keep management easy. I also have the idea of sea water sprinklers (wind turbines) that also spray water to help water evaporate off the ocean. It would create cooler temperatures, generate energy for a turbines normal function. The water evaporates before it is back to water and create a hardier source of water for rain clouds to form. Maybe we can break the cycle of a drought. Turn it on when water is needed. Know need for desalination because salt won't evaporate. Brine falls back to ocean. Salt stays in the ocean and clouds carry fresh water inland and you can find suitable places and times to do it. In another ten years do that video can't wait. 😁
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I would add to the idea and make the canal a dome, similar material to what they make the new water pipe out of, I forget the name cross-linked polyethylene I think. That way any water that does evaporate collects on the surface and drips back down. Then cover that with solar panels. Concrete was an okay medium to transfer water, but it is dated, not that flexible, can/will crack and leak etc.. I don't know the logistics behind it or the economics but if people want to keep living... kind of need water. I don't know who makes these decisions or what but they need to get together and ask all the questions. Look at all the solutions. Put out a vote and get something going before its really to late.
I know solar windows are not nearly as effective although having tall buildings use them as their windows, at least where they would get a reasonable amount of sun, well that may cost more for construction although would reduce the long term cost of powering the building.
Simple genius indeed - a fantastic idea all around!
With acess to a cannal readily available like that, I would imagine a pumped hydro storage solution would be extremely practical if there is nearby elevation.
That's a great idea
Maybe we could use the the same idea on the wasted space around our highways in the offramp and medians
Solar Panels are very ugly. Lets not spread that to everywhere.
Wouldn't canal solar require more copper per MW? Unless it boosted voltages (and reduced I2R losses) at regular intervals to high voltage cables that also run along the canal.
I am from Gujarat, India . I have following Matt for more than a year now and I am very proud today to see him take inspiration from my homestate as most of his videos cover America and UK only .
For farmers that want to grow things under the panels (agrivoltaics), you would also save land. Also parking lots and roads. There might be fish farmers that would grow fish under floating panels. Lots of ways to multi-use with solar panels.
Water consumption in cleaning solar panels is an oft raised issue. Being able to rinse them with water you pump from the canal below feels like a win! As long as you're not using any chemicals, any dust/grime that gets washed off would have landed in the water if it hadn't landed on the solar panel so there's theoretically no issue with contamination.
I'd be concerned about disturbing natural ecosystems, but there's plenty of man-made reservoirs and canals to go around. LA's reservoir uses these black plastic balls to reduce evaporation, using solar panels instead is obviously more complex but has the potential to add more value as well.
That's what I was thinking bro if solar is by water you can use the panel to pump some under pressure to blast off any dry bird crap
@cornel stamate 8 800 000. Truck loads. If truck is hauling 54,000 lbs per load
@AD Hunter I think considerations like this are why he said it is not a solution for all man made bodies of water. Although it may be possible to filter the water before using it to clean off the panels.
@Trap Johnson Right, that place. Now I think of it, why hasn't it been covered up already so the city can build parks and buildings over it? Might there just happen to be areas where one side is notably lower class than the other and some people don't want them to meet?
As soon as I read your comment I have had this vision in my mind of some Darwin Award nominees climbing on the solar panels to spraypaint them and falling however far down... You can bet the news would not focus on how solar made the world a better place by lowering the number of idiots.
There are certain PR issues with covering parts of a city with solar panels, and not just because the media tends to make big news of slightest problems. If we put them in a desert they give cool shade for plants and animals to thrive, but in a city they would have to be in somewhat open and sunny area to get most benefit, meaning they would likely shadow places that people left open and sunny on purpose.
Big roads can be lit with LED lights and covering them from the rain might lower chances of accidents, but it is not a completely closed tunnel so some rain would still get in, LEDs break down all the time so maintenance costs would rise, and now there is a roof over the road so traffic control helicopters and drones just became useless.
A canopy over pedestrian walkways protecting you from the rain and snow and midday heat sounds great... not so much if it darkens the alleys so much criminals can hide there to ambush you.
Parking lots sound like the best place to cover in panels, but it needs to keep the lights on all the time to avoid traffic accidents and making a hideaway for criminals. Parks, of course, would be a nonstarter.
Finally, even though there is "free" space in cities and you would save money on not needing to build long transmission lines, the buildings can shade the panels so much your ROI goes from two years to ten or twenty. Easy solution: Put the panel roof higher so fewer things can shadow it...
So, yeah, solar is great tech that will help us a lot, but maybe we should avoid any projects that might create something like the Midgar slums...
@Jim (Chaim) Roberts It’s not the voltage but the power efficiency that goes down with covering. Every bit helps when you talk about large scale stuff.
Thank you. It's unbelievable that this kind of irrigation is prevalent in a cutting edge state as California (I know about it for years, it's not new for me). This is how the Soviet Union emptied the 4th largest lake in the world, the Aral sea. It's time for moving to sealed water pipes and drip irrigation...
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Try doing the math on how much more water you have to use for flooding, vs how much you might lose from using drip! For very hot climates like that, most of the water will end up evaporating, not in the aquifers - and when it eventually come back down as rain, it will probably be somewhere else, also not doing anything for the aquifers - at least not the locals ones you are using!
Saving water will be better!
Replenish aquifers? Are you mad or just uniformed?
And what you do not seem to know is that flood irrigation helps to refresh the ground water aquifers. going to drip irrigation, etc has had a negative effect on the aquifers
I saw a solar farm over a retention pond. I thought it was a good idea. So much land here in Florida is used to preserve the water table and these solar farms could be a perfect adjunct
I have an question tho .. reducing the Evaporation an area what kind of effect will it have on the Weather ? clouds as such .. i doubt 1% of total can do much but things have effected weather with less.
Arizona would also be a great place for this. Phoenix and the outlining cities are covered in canals
I am surprised more Amazon or Ikea warehouses in PA, NJ and across the country do not have SOLAR on their roofs. Do you know why this is? Do corporations and TECH companies NOT want to seem like innovators???? I see them once in a while, but not on the scale that you would think IT SHOULD BE at this point.
Imagine doing this over the Colorado River? It would seem something like this should at least be analyzed and, if determined to be able to do all of the things mentioned in this video, it's a project that should be started right away.
Hi Matt, thanks for the video! That's a very interesting solution, and we need to start to find ways to optime our resources and go for really clean energy sources. Our crew recently filmed a very problematic situation happening in Europe. In the middle of the energy crisis, a lot has been said about wood pellets as a cleaner and more sustainable energy resource. But our findings were very controversial.
Thanks for sharing!
@Kevin Roll It is greener/cleaner than burning petroleum or coal. Petroleum and coal products release "new" CO2 to the atmosphere. Carbon / CO2 which has been sequestered under ground for millions of years. That sequestered Carbon reduced the atmospheric concentration of C02, contributing to global cooling hundreds of millions of years ago.
The carbon released from burning pellets was taken from the atmosphere to grow the the tree, and returned upon burning. It is a short term "circular" economy. Nothing gained, nothing lost, net zero change over the lifecycle. Regardless, the CO2 from the wood pellets would have been returned to the atmosphere in relatively short time as the wood waste was decomposed.
Burning wood pellets close to location wood was grown incurs relatively small transportation CO2 expense.
Burning wood pellets that have been transported across an ocean has very little credibility as "green" fuel. It is "green washing".
Sustainable but not clean at all, burning things just isn't green/clean...
Unfortunately a lot of that wood comes from Canadian and US forest.plantations. It's NOT green energy if shipped half way around the world.
I've seen mention of wood pellets too. If they are locally supplied, from "waste" wood, sure they may be reasonable. But I've seen suggestions of shipping pellets from North America to Europe. I can't see how that could be ecologically (CO2) viable.
Might be more initial cost on water but no ground clearing/levelling or loss of agriculture bushland would have to come into play.
Could add fog catchers in conjunction with these floatovoltaic systems that drain into the canals to be extra wise.
yes. and mount the panels high enough to allow boat traffic. you know. to transport goods and for scenic tours.
Why not?! Definitely couldn’t hurt to do more testing and if it seems reasonable then fill out the most suitable areas.
I'm curious what happens when they get snow. Do you have to send someone out onto the water in a dinghy with a snow brush?
Keeping water cool and liquid. People don't realize how fast water evaporates in the desert. It's almost more important than the 18GW that it would generate. This is something that will catch on only after water scarcity is taken seriously.
Would there be a way to link two elevators together with a cable & pulleys to use one going down to reduce the energy cost of the other going up?
One of the best things about solar panels is their placement flexibility. They can go on all sorts of waste space (like covering canals, and parking lots, and roofs). The placement may not be as ideally efficient as a perfect solar farm location, but it should be enough to be cost-effective, while also solving other problems, such as canal/reservoir evaporation.
@Dave Stagner I agree CO2 is ONE of the primary causes. Land use change is the other. Again, not in dispute by anyone. The feedbacks are secondary to these other two, but much larger than the other 2 combined. These feedbacks are what drive the majority of climate change. For the most part, these feedbacks are educated guesses and "reasonable hypothesis" and not scientific facts, at least not at this point. Also, these are not "tipping points" that is something different, at least not as I understand what a tipping point is.
The entire chain of efficiency is what matters. Though for fossil fuels, it's rather moot as whatever "energy subsidies" they get (like powering a refinery), they get from fossil fuels.
If you think fossil fuel cars will stop being produced around 2040, you can expect fossil fuel cars on the road until at least 2060. But I believe this is EXTREMELY unlikely. EVs are already a good 25 thousand dollars more than ICE cars. That is likely to increase, not decrease. Lithium batteries are likely to get very expensive, very soon. The cost to charge them is likely to go up, but so is probably the price of gasoline, at least in the short to medium term.
You said "But there’s a simple solution to that - replace coal and gas with renewables as rapidly as possible, which is exactly what the world is doing right now"
But now we're back to the abysmal EROI of solar. Wind is better, but cannot be deployed as widely as solar and is not as cheap as solar.
Your counterfactual about Germany is ridiculous. It's "heads I win, tails you lose" Germany's power is so high because of all the renewables, not in spite of all the renewables. Maybe today literally, but not in 2020. Not in 2021. Only 2022 and because of the war. Germany has had the highest electric prices in Europe (some of the highest in the world) for over a decade, long before the war troubles.
Toyota is all in on hydrogen.
I didn't say storing hydrogen or converting it to ammonia is "impossible" I said running western civ on solar and wind is impossible. And it is. People on your side of the argument have looked at this Canadian deal and it's crap from an energy point of view. Given the abysmal numbers, I'll be surprised if the project ever breaks even (in energy terms) after all of the energy expended is taken into consideration. Germany has plenty of wind. They should just sell them the windmills.
Biofuels made from land based plant life are an absolute no starter. We should stop making ethanol from corn TODAY. A brand new study was just released on corn ethanol and it's probably negative energy wise. Engineering explained on youtube recently did a video on the study.
Biofuels from sea weed and algae are much more promising and don't compete with farmland.
Frankly, I don't think you understand or comprehend the enormous scale of the problem. We have 10s of trillions of Dollars worldwide invested in machinery/plant/equipment that need fossil fuels and will only run on fossil fuels or a biofuel equivalent.. Some of this equipment has very long lives. There is a ton of embedded energy in these machines.
For a consumer example of embedded energy and how much it matters, if you want to be "green" buy an older car and run it into the ground (meaning drive it as long as humanly possible). This is MUCH "greener" (I hate that word because it means nothing) than buying a new electric car. The same is true with heavy equipment. Scrapping a 5 year old bulldozer to buy a new electric one (assuming such a thing existed) would give you the same dilemma. It's better to just keep the existing one.
Why are you so hyper-focused on EVs and solar panels and wind? There are so many far less costly things we could be doing today to significantly reduce energy consumption/co2. We are doing none of these things. Everyone wants a magic fix where the status quo is maintained in almost every detail except we magically live on solar. Solar and wind particularly appeal to people because of their "back to nature" aesthetics. People like idyllic scenes of the country with windmills in the background. James Howard Kunstler (I highly recommend his blog) calls it "techno-narcissism" We're going run Walmart, Disney World and the interstate highway system on solar panels and windmills. This thinking has become common in everyone. I'm not just picking on environmentalists here.
@christo930 I do agree that we’ll see the last remnants of the ICE passenger vehicle industry through 2040, but the bullet is in the gut. Now it’s just a question of how long it takes the industry to bleed out. And I think we can come to at least an impasse on the causes of warming. I don’t disagree with your secondary sources (like loss of polar ice changing the albedo - that’s a “tipping point” effect), although I’ll note that polar ice changes and others are themselves a consequence of the warming initiated by CO2. And you agree that CO2 is the primary problem and must be addressed. So I don’t really think any of this is a real contention between us.
If you want to count the entire chain of efficiency for EV energy, you need to do the same for ICEs (especially since you are noting, fairly, that carbon-based electricity is contributing to EV energy). But there’s a simple solution to that - replace coal and gas with renewables as rapidly as possible, which is exactly what the world is doing right now. And there are a lot of technophile EV owners that have put solar panels on their roofs and are mostly running their EVs that way, charging at home for all but long road trips. But even counting the entire energy chain and all inefficiencies, it’s beyond dispute that EVs are using much less energy than ICEs, and causing FAR less carbon emissions. You don’t disagree with that, either. Demanding 100% purity and perfection is neither practical nor fair. There must be a transition period, and we are in the midst of that transition, and will be for the next two or three decades. (By way of analogy… I’m trying to lose weight. But I didn’t get to just snap my fingers and instantly be at my goal weight. I’m halfway there, in a hard-fought transition to a new, healthy self. And it’s sometimes frustrating. But it doesn’t mean I can’t do it, or I shouldn’t be trying just because I haven’t yet succeeded.)
So it seems to me our points of contention are down to implementation. You don’t think it’s possible to move entirely to EVs because there isn’t enough lithium in the world, AND you don’t believe that alternatives to lithium for EV use are possible. But even if there isn’t enough lithium for all purposes in the long run, there’s enough for now, and enough to get us through 2040 at least, and there’s strong motivation to recycle batteries to recover lithium. But more importantly, the prospect of sharp cost increases from lithium shortage is a strong motivator for alternative research. Major players like Toyota, BYD, NASA, and many other academic and commercial interests are working on sodium, solid-state sulfur/selenium, and other alternatives that can match or even beat lithium ion’s capacity and charge/discharge rates, using common and inexpensive materials. Even if lithium is always “best”, it won’t be “only”, and any tech that is “good enough” and far cheaper will always have a market. That’s why we don’t all drive Ferrari and Rolls-Royce, right? My Subaru is good enough and much cheaper.
As for hydrogen… electrolysis is 60-70% efficient, so it’s not THAT bad, and some of the catalytic processes are hitting 90% now. And hydrogen factories can be built in remote areas far from urban centers that happen to have great wind or sun. The Canadian project you talked about is a good example, and a European consortium is building a large plant in Chile as well. Points about the difficulty of storing hydrogen are well taken, but it’s not impossible… just difficult. Converting to ammonia is an example. (This seems to be the root of our contention, too… when something is difficult, you see “impossible” and I see “possible”.) My main concern with hydrogen is that, even in my optimistic scenarios, it will still be more expensive than fossil natural gas. That puts it beyond the point where market forces alone can force the switch, and it will take government intervention. But I also think the political will to take such steps is rapidly growing - even more so since Russia exposed the world’s vulnerability to gas supplies in the hands of murderous dictatorships like Russia and Saudi Arabia.
And this all comes down to cost, doesn’t it? Not efficiency. The market is your best friend or your worst enemy. When market forces alone want to do the right thing (like the current hard swing to wind/solar because they are now the cheapest raw electricity sources), great. But when they don’t, sometimes political force is required, and that will inevitably cost more, at least in the short run. That being said, I don’t think it’s fair to beat up on Germany’s energy prices right now, when they’d be in WORSE shape if they hadn’t put so much effort into domestic renewables (or worse, they’d be forced to cave to Russian belligerence). And California was a mess in terms of power costs and brownouts long before the shift to modern renewables… remember Enron and what California power markets were like 20 years ago? Other places, like my beloved home state of Minnesota, are transitioning rapidly to renewables without high prices or instability. And as grid storage catches up with the new renewable sources, stability will become the norm everywhere.
And finally, biofuels… I’ve been advocating for biofuels since the 1990s, but I’ve actually become disenchanted with them lately. The problem, as you’d put it, is efficiency. The amount of land and water required to farm biofuel crops could be generating more power with direct PV solar, even with the cost of transformation to fuel factored in. I think we’re heading toward a world of tiered energy prices, trading price against immediate needs. The cheapest tier by far will be direct solar/wind, followed by short-term storage in batteries (etc). After that comes clean fuels - biofuels, hydrogen, other synthetic fuels. Nuclear will hang on if its base load nature can beat the long-term cost of the renewable/battery/synfuels system, or it’ll fade away if it can’t match the new prices. Fossil fuels will have to be killed off in the end by political action - anything from carbon taxes to outright bans. But look at the angry kids out there slashing tires on SUVs today, and remember that in twenty years, they’re going to be winning elections. I wouldn’t be surprised to see many fossil fuel systems actively outlawed through most of the world by 2050.
@Dave Stagner NO. An EV moves much of its inefficiency somewhere else and not measured in these MPGe ratings.(most of the losses occurred before the electricity got into the battery to recondition("recharge") it) We are talking thermal efficiency. Unless an EV is being powered with solar or wind, the efficiency drops precipitously. There are (large) losses at the generator, there are losses in the grid, there are losses in the charging and discharging. They are more efficient than a gasoline burning car, but nowhere near what these MPG numbers would make you think.
Your "facts" leave out this important part of the overall efficiency of an EV. How convenient that you start at the battery and not at the source of energy.
We ain't got no hydrogen. Hydrogen would be a great fuel in some ways if we actually had some, but we don't. It has to made. So far, almost all hydrogen is made by steam retort. You burn a bunch of natural gas to heat water to steam, then you use that steam on other natural gas and strip away the hydrogen.
The electrolysis method is extremely inefficient. The new method requires catalysts and is also fairly inefficient, though nowhere near as inefficient as regular electrolysis.
Japan is on the verge of something called "red hydrogen" (IIRC) which could be a game changer for hydrogen.
Storing hydrogen is difficult and expensive. Even this Canadian project I was telling you about is converting the hydrogen into ammonia to try and avoid the difficulty and expense of liquid hydrogen or highly compressed hydrogen.
Oil derived from algae or seaweed or something is a much better fuel. It is compatible with the trillions in capital equipment we already have and would have to be scrapped.
I am not aware of anyone proposing to use nuclear for load matching. Nuclear is base load. Without base load, we don't have a grid, we have chaos.
Again, I point you to locales and countries with very high renewables. They have high prices, some of the highest in the world. Everyone loves pointing at Germany's renewables, but not their rates.
I told you what the other contributors were, land use and feedback mechanisms. 3/4s of a degree C is what the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere from pre-industrial levels would do and is doing.
Have you ever heard of the urban heat island effect? It's very large. It can produce a 10 degree F temperature difference in the city compared to the outlaying areas around that city. All the black roofs and paved surfaces heat up and radiate that heat into the area. Waste heat from heat engines in cities. Probably smog plays a role at night keeping the heat from escaping. Forests do not heat up nearly as much as say farmland. Farm lands do not heat up nearly as much as paved surfaces. Land change use is a major contributor to global warming. This is not in dispute. According to google, it's 23% of global warming. That is almost a 1/4 of the warming.
But the really big contributor is feedback loops. I gave you the most cited example of dark oceans replacing highly reflective ice in the polar regions. Again, this is not in dispute. NOBODY disputes this.
None of these are out of the mainstream. There is not one mainstream climate scientist would tell you land usage and feedback loops are not primary global warming causes. Of course, this would also include co2. When I cite these things, it is I not you (denying these things) who are in the mainstream of climate science.
I do not oppose taking steps to prevent climate change. As for insurance, would you take out an insurance policy with an insolvent insurance issuer? If we're going to bet the farm on something, I want to chose something with a very high likelihood of working. AND, 1/2 measures are useless. At best, they buy time. But that is all 1/2 measures can do. We need to ELIMINATE not reduce CO2. But right now, we don't have that ability.
Worst, we refuse to do the little things that would buy a lot more time. Covid's work from home policy caused an enormous global reduction in co2 (though it wasn't the only thing). We have abandoned that model already. In the US, I would venture to guess 25% or more of all workers could work from home all or most of the time.
We grow cotton in the US and put it on container ships to Asia where that cotton is processed and knitted into t-shirts and socks, put back on a giant boat and shipped to America. We are powerless (seemingly) to reverse this silly concept. We fly fresh vegetables in from Vietnam, vegetables that grow here with no problem. We literally import bottled water from Asia. Outside a few major commodities, we recycle almost nothing. There is no infrastructure set up to deal with trying to recycle all these batteries. The world is not even close to ready to displace the ICE engine. More and more is coming out how there is no possible way to increase lithium, cobalt and nickel at a fast enough rate to meet the supposed goals of banning ICE cars by 2032.
Various auto-makers are rapidly improving the thermal efficiency of the ICE. Even if everything goes as smoothly as possible, the ICE powered passenger vehicle will be with us to at least 2040, IMHO.
Dams ocean too !
@christo930 Ok, in that case, I’ll try. Let’s start with relative efficiency of EVs. There’s actually a government-approved measurement for this - MPGe, or MPG equivalent. (Please, don’t fall onto that “the government is corrupt” nonsense.) A Tesla 3 is rated for 132 MPGe. This is not out of line with other standard EVs, which are in the 120-135 MPGe range (120 for larger models like the Tesla S or Lucid Air, or less well made models like the Chevy Bolt). The Bolt is comparable to the Chevy Spark at 33 MPG, so about 4x better. Tesla S compares to a BMW 7 Series at 27 MPG, so more than 4x. Not surprising, since even the longest-range EVs with the largest batteries carry the energy equivalent of only three gallons of gasoline. You can believe the government, or you can believe simple arithmetic, or you can believe your own preconceptions. All I can do is tell you the facts. What matters isn’t theoretical efficiency in ideal conditions. What matters is working mileage on the road. So we don’t need NEARLY as much electricity to operate vehicles as we do gasoline, in terms of total energy.
As for hydrogen… I think green hydrogen is an important solution for the future, not because it’s efficient (it’s not), but because it’s a FUEL, and has the advantages of a fuel. It can be stored indefinitely at high density, and it’s portable. You can make it in one place and ship it to another. It can be used in modified gas peaker power plants, so they can do what they already do - provide grid demand management. Except instead of balancing demand against inflexible base load coal/nuclear plants that can’t easily scale up or down, it can balance against the variability of solar/wind.
Which gets to a key problem… matching grid supply to grid demand, which varies over the course of a day, by weather and season and other things, usually over 50% over the course of a day. This is something the nuclear-only people don’t understand - nuclear has the same problem as renewables for matching demand, but from the opposite direction. Rather than variability, nuclear is invariable. It works on the current grid because fossil-powered gas peaker plants provide demand responsiveness - at great cost. A mostly nuclear grid will need storage for load balancing as much as a mostly renewable grid. And into that gap falls the expensive but workable nature of grid storage - batteries, thermal, hydrogen, etc. And we’ll probably need a variety of solutions to match a variety of circumstances.
Finally, I want to address your soft-pedaled rejection of mainstream thinking on the role of anthropogenic CO2 in global warming. I know you really really want to believe that it’s not just CO2, but… what if it is? What if the vast majority of climate scientists are, in fact, right? And what if they’re right about tipping points we’re facing, such as the loss of the polar ice cap, Greenland ice, and large parts of the Antarctic ice? What if they’re right about melting of the permafrost suddenly releasing massive amounts of methane? If you own a home, you have insurance… not because you think your house will burn down (it’s very unlikely), but because you know it CAN. We can’t just let civilization itself hang in the balance of our faith in a best case scenario that few actual experts believe in, no matter how comforting that faith may feel. We don’t have the luxury of forcing the scientists to prove they’re right by experience before acting on their warnings. It’ll be too late then, just like you can’t get insurance after your house has already burned down.
im curious on how much damage the lack of evaporation and cloud generation as well a dryer atmosphere this will cause for the local flora and fauna
@TheAnnoyingBoss not the kind of data I was looking for, I was look at information similar Americans loosing 824 million IQ points due to leaded fuel, damaging the capabilities of the country substantially, or cfc's shredding the ozone, causing far high skin cancer rates in those south of the equator than there otherwise would have been. What you see doesn't tell the full story.
Bro a lot of the water they're putting this stuff on is man made. The atmosphere can handle changes in moisture levels. I live in a desert high up and the air is thin and the plants are alive. My blood as all the oxygen it needs. The animals are alive. The bushes grow. I get on a plane and go down lower by a lake and the air is thick with water you feel like you can chew it and everything is still alive bro. That's all I'm saying. You're worrying too much. The ocean is most of the earth bro. I think we should think a lot about that because that says a lot about the space we have available to us to do things. I just wonder, what is some things we should make that sit inside the ocean and what will they do.
Solar panel above canals and reservoirs make sense. But, solving climate change relies too often on technology, whilst human behaviour is absolved. Generally, US residents are wasteful with resources and consider this to be an scriptable part of their way of life, if not their immuable right. California's residential water consumption is set legally at a maximum 208 liters (55 US gallons) per person per day. In actually, far more is used: back in May 2022, daily consumption peaked at 291 liters. In the UK, actual consumption is 142 liters per person per day, or less than half that of California's. Being less wasteful would help Californians a lot, although I don't see how a self-centered and entitled culture hell-bent of the right to do anything one wants with little care for consequences can change sufficiently to reduce waste.
I anticipate already comments about 80% of water in California being used for agriculture, thus diverting the blame away from personal use. Don't worry: I have thoughts on that too, other than the obvious, but yet so evident, "every little helps", which so many of us fail to apply.
I lived in Tempe AZ for a few years. They have lots of man made canals in the area. This is one of the hottest and driest areas in the world and they just made canals that slowly moving water that sits in dry and hot air. This seems the perfect solution to two problems plus the benefits of more solar power then could be possible without the cooling effect of the water under the solar panels. I have had solar on my home for over 10 years now. Nothing produces more power then a sunny 55-60 degree day. Very exciting.
Building cities and piling up people in a desert don't make sense either.
It's an obvious win for California. The California Aqueduct and the larger side canals are quite literally a perfect fit. Not too narrow, not too wide... just right. Runs most of the length of the state and evaporation is a big issue. Also runs through the central valley which is flat and wide-open, so no trees on the sides, and is near transmission line infrastructure in many places along the route. You can't ask for much more than that!
Finally this is a sensible idea. Few years ago I was pretty surprised to see, that they put the solar farms into the fields and then move the vegetable growing on top of houses and high-rise buildings. The next idea was to put the solar panels under the roads. Panels over canals make sense, just like how putting solar panels above parking lots. A few malls already did that around me, and it's great.
Check the link on agrovoltaics because there are a lot of crop plants that grow better under cover.
Smaller scale first.
Photo Voltaics over Electrical Vehicle Charging Stations. The infrastructure already exists and production of current EV’s can meet the demand easily. Shaded cars use less AC, cooler cars/cooler batteries have longer service lives, and much of the power losses due transmission to distance can be ignored because the power is used locally. And of course excess gets fed back into the grid.
0:02 - wait...how drought records have started for the Western US 1200 years ago when the western world had not arrived on the continent until only 400 (give or take) years ago? 🙂
Also, I think "phlotovoltaics" is slightly funnier than "floatovoltaics".
can you please make a video about the end of a solar panel. we have so many sitting in warehouses in Melbourne Australia because they can't recycle them.
OMG look at you! I remember finding your Clip-Share thinking 'how is it possible this guy has so few subscribers'. Figured it would come cuz the vids were top shelf. Look how many subs you have NOW. PROPS
Hmm the issue I’ve read is Cali isn’t filling their lakes. Sending water to save an extinct fish in the bay seems like a huge problem leading to wasted water. They measure the salt in the bay but some are speculating the salt isn’t from the ocean but potentially some of the readings could be from pollution leaking into the bay.
One problem I’ve seen is recycling. Can they or will they recycle the silver from solar panels? If they don’t then solar panels are as dirty and polluting as fossil fuels considering how much environmental damage went into getting those metals.
Mildly surprised Singapore's own floatovoltaic array wasn't mentioned, since it's one of the largest floating solar farms in the world right now.
I'm sure people have thought of this but I didn't hear it addressed in this. As great as the water savings would be to have, how would the reduced evaporation from this end up affecting the water cycle as a whole? In the case of covering all the canals in this way, would that do anything overall to the amount of rainfall a year?
There are quite a few things I worry about with this "solution", now while I agree that this seems like a viable alternative to solar farm when placed upon locations such as, irrigation canals and waste treatment pools or otherwise brackish hostile water features.
I vehemently disagree with putting them atop water sources such as lakes or reservoirs, those places are quite often used by both people and wildlife alike, take Lake Mead for example boating and fishing are quite popular there, not only will those panels be a serious boating hazard but how will they impact the ecosystem of the fish?
Not to mention even if they were to be installed there they would likely do next to nothing regarding the evaporation and consumption issue of the water, to me it seems more like a fever dream for the renewable cultists more than anything.
Now onto the cost issue for one who is gonna be paying for this? the federal govt? the state govt? private investors? the farmers? With the extensive canal system California has it is by no means going to be cheap, especially for a state that has one of highest tax ratios in the nation, if the goal is to mitigate evaporation loss than a simple tin or tarp cover can achieve the same effect minus the power generation at a fraction of the installation cost, then there is also the maintenance costs to considered who is going to be paying for that? How frequent will it have to be? How many man hours will it take? How many employees will be needed? etc.
Again this seems like a bunch or renewable nerds hyper focusing on one issue while ignoring everything else that goes along with it, not to mention if power is the main problem then we have had the solution for that for the better part of a century... nuclear power it takes up a fraction of the land renewables do while pumping out far more power and its just as clean when all factors are considered, heck I lived within 5 miles of one for a good chunk of my life and are no worse off from it nor was the environment in fact the wildlife boomed in the area surrounding it. While on the flip side I've seen wind turbines for example murder birds on the daily and nearly kill about a dozen people when one of the blades broke off.
While this solar option was likely a good move for India due to their excessive worker pool, low labor costs and less diversified energy production, those same factors do not apply in California's case.
@TheAnnoyingBoss I wasn't referring to fusion but fission plants which pump out around 1,700 MW on average with the largest among them putting out over 7,000 MW, far more so than any renewable source has done aside from hydro but you can only make a very finite number of dams.
And fusion is absolutely nowhere near that by any stretch of the imagination as we still can barely understand or replicate it however, we understand fission quite well and have been using for the better part of a century to power things from homes to aircraft carries, heck France has been powering 70% of their country with it alone and its still one of the cleanest and safest energy sources we got.
The energy conundrum is a difficult question to tackle, but I don't see being wholly dependent on renewables as the way forward there is to many drawbacks to them as they stand now, ideally with the current tech available our best option is a 80-90% nuclear and a 10-20% renewable grid, with the investments going into SMR's as well nuclear plants will be far easier to place in locations that would otherwise be difficult for larger fission plants.
Nuclear sucks bro. These morons come out talking about fusion where they used a whole bunch of space to put 2 megawatts in and get 3 out and they got bills to pay for being at a +33% power production rate. That's nuclear bro 😂 you ask how many alarms are going off they tell you probably 10. There's gotta be a better way bro. I've been thinking about it a lot and it's hard.
These are great. This combined with parking lot coverings of solar panels would significantly reduce the strain on the grid.
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Either billions or millions, the metric conversion from gallons to litres is still either equally millions or billions.
Right?
the way this guy talks makes it seems like these things aren't all gimmicks, but I have yet to see him talk about something practical and useable in the actual world
First issue I see is I'd be uncomfortable putting heavy metals and all the toxic materials above the entire water supply
I often say "We need to implement any solution to mitigate our changing climate problems ... optimize costs later when we can catch our breath". Just saying. And combined with Matt's info presented here, there's positive side effects to be had.
Hey, what about south-facing dams? These are otherwise-useless surfaces that are already connected to and serving the power grid. 😲
I really like your videos, thank you! As a SI unit user, thank you for having the conversions on screen. However if the source value is rounded the converted value should also be rounded. For example 90,000 acres is not 36,421.71 hectares but 36,000 hectares. And in that case more logical unit would be square kilometers.
Pan evaporation rates for Phoenix, az is 120inches per year so shading these canals would save huge amounts of water!
There should definitely be some sort of cover for irrigation canals to prevent water loss, with or without the solar bonus it needs to be done, that process should plan with future solar in mind, build the covers using the same or a compatible construction method for the agro voltaics
I wonder if shading the water might increase algae growth?
algae needs sunlight to grow. no sun = no growth
This concept was first seen in China where FVs were installed over an exhausted open pit coal mine which was substantially flooded. REF:clip-share.net/video/uCSGw6TsEhU/video.html
Photovoltaic is great, except they have reached in many places and EXCESS of daily power. Ask California. They have, for the past few years sold power in excess generation from solar, but other states, Arizona and Nevada don't buy it much since they too have lots of solar power. In at least 1 year, California PAID Arizong to take their excess power while several plants were idle. The issue is at night. Wind does NOT provide anything close to a constant level of power. We won't ever have enough batter storage to run all night. While this idea is good for retaining water, you also have to weigh in what happens during heavy winds and the ability to do work on the system easily. Canals are the way to go, floating in settlement ponds, cooling ponds, sewer treatment ponds etc are better, because when you start putting them in reservoirs that are used it will meet opposition.
If you build a few desalination plant, you can run them on excess power you otherwise have to pay other states to take it. That solves two problem in one go.
Your video is very pun-tastic this time around. Nicely done.
Truthfully, I think all wasted spaces should have solar panels over them, parking lots, flat roofs, irrigation ponds and canals, etc...
I've seen Clip-Share videos of self adjusting solar panel stands. If something like this was used, the sun's position would no longer be an issue.
I guess the cost to maintain the adjusting facilities are far higher than the loss of energy due to a non-south faced panel.
*_👆👆👆Reachout for investment guidance and profit making prowess❤️_*
Hi, am I right in thinking most of these (apparently long) canals feed various other areas. If so does this mean there is a drop in elevation along the canals? Should this be the case, could wears be built along these canals at regular intervals and host the introduction of turbine systems to produce electricity along with the photovoltaic panels. From previous videos Matt, there would only require a fall of 3metres to operate said turbines. This would help reduce running costs of the panels and give more incentive to implement these technologies.
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As you said, no one size fits all. But the scarcer the water, the more we'll invest to have it.
Great videos Matt! Love the potential behind this one!
Anyone else see the irony in paying a company to unhook you from other companies that may or may not have sold your info online without your consent? Also, paying for this service doesn't actually save you from leaks, because that's just info that is OUT THERE now, nothing to be done about it but change passwords to affected accounts...
Floating solar can reduce local weather change arround water reseroir. No more fog arround..
Balancing photovoltaic and hydro make reliable power generation.
It will reduce algar growth in irrigation water too.
They did this in India - and then had to hire a large number of security guards to prevent vandalism and theft of the panels.
I’ve been saying that covering the canal running through the high desert in California would save a bunch of water and using solar panels could power the lift pumps easily. Converting the spillway around Glendale to a pipe and using the head pressure to generate electricity too
in france they even monted vertical double sided solar panels oriented east west along the water canals to provide electricity in the morning and evening when horizontal panel mounted on the water canal were not so eficient. in that way they took advantage of the electricity grid already installed for the horizontal panels
This definitely feels like something we should get good at doing. Even if isn't the one-stop fix that it sounds like it could be, it seems like something we should have in the mix. I'm curious if any of these installations need to provide boat access? Or do they just target canals that don't use boats?
@David Reyes Gonzalez Aragon Depends. A foot of I-beam costs about $10 for materials, you might have about 300 support posts per mile, so the cost of raising the roof by 10' would be few tens of thousands per mile.
The panels alone would cost couple million dollars per mile, without counting the framework or the installation costs. And a lot of canals seem to lack access roads along their full length, so using barges would save the cost of building those.
If we can get those savings for only 1% of the budget it seems like a rather good deal.
However, the original plan was to keep the panels cool and shade the canal, and raising the panels too high would probably cause problems for those functions.
And while it seems obvious to use a boat for working on a canal, the boat would obviously be under the panels while the workers would need access to the top side.
So maybe that part of the idea is a bust anyway... But unless my estimates are wildly wrong, the cost should not be an issue.
@AnalystPrime It makes sense for easier repairng but then the added cost for elevating the structure could place the viability of the project in question. Maybe boats are not needed and just drone usage for inspections + cranes for actual maintance works could do the trick. It definitely sounds like a great alternative within the Solar energy field.
@NYFB Productions Oh, the boats would fit just fine under a low ceiling. The people crouching in them who would complain to OSHA for bad working conditions, not so much. And the boat might have a crane or other equipment installed for getting at the panels.
Also, the canal itself may need bigger boats for dredging or other maintenance.
The issue here is that many canals do not have a handy road next to them, so either we need to allow for boats that carry whatever machinery is needed for repairing and eventually replacing the panels*, or build access roads on both sides so construction equipment can access the whole length of it.
*:Oh, yeah, given there would be thousands, possibly 10000+ solar panels per mile, and maybe hundreds of miles of canals, we will also want to carry the new panels in and old panels out on boats, which use far less fuel than cars.
@AnalystPrime Given the width and depth on most irrigation canals, I would imagine most boats used for maintenance are low profile flat-bottomed dinghies. I've seen people squeeze those under 2-3 foot tall bridges with minimal issues, so it's something that should be accounted for, but I don't think it will be a serious concern.
@Fire Angel One negative to that application is the increased heat found in heavily built up urban areas or just from the surface of a concrete or asphalt roadway. Solar panels loose efficiency with higher temperature. It would work but wouldn't be as efficient as the water based solution proposed here.
Great video Matt. This makes total sense in a country like Australia. We allegedly have 16000 Sq kms of water catchements and the 4th highest water use in the OECD. Would be keen to know the impact to aquatic life.
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I wouldn't say this would SOLVE the drought issue, but it absolutely CAN help reduce water loss. My daughter-in-law lives in Antelope Valley north of Los Angeles, where a significant length of the California Aqueduct that feeds water to L.A. traverses. It has ALWAYS mystified me why they never tried to cover the Aqueduct in any fashion, because it is obvious to any and all that evaporation losses of uncovered water in a desert valley with nearly year-round high winds is an enormous waste.
as someone who watch my generated power on graph it hurts my eyes to see how many of that instalations had obsticles to cast shadows, if you don't have expensive optimisers on each panel it massively decrease your power yealds just from small shadow ower one cell in series
most of this gigant instalations is just kind of greenwashing and wasting taxpayers money if not done propperly
Wow, very nice Matt.
More than 173,000 terawatts Solar energy hits the earth continuously - We just need to develop engineering to access it and power the world!
I'm more interested in the potential for floating solar. Since you can use simpler dual-axis tracking systems, you can generate far more power , while avoiding the duck-tail effect of fixed solar. Also, gravity dams can act as fast-acting energy storage.
Matt, the more I watch your content the closer I come to the decision that renewable energy will not be practical. Every discussion about renewable energy results in an expensive impractical solution that proves time and time again that renewable energy is a luxury, but not a sustainable solution.
We are losing water because of vaporation - yes…but agricultural practices have taken about 70 percent of water
I wonder if something similar to Fog nets could be placed between the panel and the canal since the structure to support the solar panels will also support the fog net or gels or such could be placed since above the water has a higher humidity. dont know if it is feasible but any way to save more water using the structures built for other green projects would help