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Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

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Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#81

Post by atomi »

quotemstr wrote: post #69
gdubs wrote: post #46

Our area of Oregon recently banned new solar farms on the grounds that it detracts from the beauty of the landscape – a wine region with lots of tourism. Ironically, that very beauty is threatened by the changing climate, which clean energy could help mitigate.

Let's be real for a second. Climate change isn't going to destroy Oregon's wine-growing regions within our lifetimes. A solar farm will change it within months. You can support or oppose solar farm bans according to your liking, but you should do so on the basis of facts. The two forces aren't even close to equal in magnitude and timing.

> isn't going to destroy Oregon's wine-growing regions within our lifetimes

Shameless.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#82

Post by newyankee »

Grakel wrote: post #2

There's no shortage of open area to put solar panels. If we put a (nearly) continuous strip in every highway median, that would be a huge step forward, and still take up practically zero useable space. Even 1% of the federally owned land in the sun belt would generate an enormous amount of power.

I was wondering if they can be put up on poles holding train's electric tractive wires and then fed directly to the same wire. The issue i see is dc to ac conversion and lot of variability management.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#83

Post by adrianmonk »

There is a LOT of low-hanging fruit when it comes to where to install plain old regular solar.

We could probably spend the next 50-100 years installing as many (regular) solar panels as possible and still have plenty of places left to put more of them.

Obviously it's not bad to develop these technologies, but I think they'll only be useful in niche applications.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#84

Post by richardrk »

"Maximizing the generation of electricity is a desirable goal, but might be at the expense of biomass production. For example, for lettuce, the total biomass yield under agrivoltaic installation in Montpellier (France) was 15–30% less than the control conditions (i.e., full‐sun conditions).[28, 29] When growth of tomato was tested in Japan, the yield in an agrivoltaic regime was about 10% lower than for conventional agriculture."

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#85

Post by dghughes »

My mother ayed tomatoes in the spring when it was still cool. She covered them with clear plastic bags as she always has. But she needed one more bag so she used a blue recycling bag on one of the plants. Blue tinged really it's almost clear.

I pointed out to her one of the plants had yellow leaves. It was the plant with the blue bag.

Later in the summer the blue bag plant produced fruit just like the other plants. But the bottom of each tomato was disfigured and looked rotten but it was dry to the touch. It's blossom rot due to low calcium. I have to wonder if it was the blue bag or lack of/too much water. All the plants got the same nutrients only this one had the blue bag. It got red light and green light which plants don't need but no blue light.

Plants are seemingly very sensitive to sunlight quality. I'm sure the solar panels are clear but even a slight colour blockage may be harmful.

It was an interesting result.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#86

Post by pas »

codefreakxff wrote: post #79
quotemstr wrote: post #70

Besides: nuclear power plants take up very little space. I really can't seriously people pushing solar, wind, and so on while they eschew nuclear power (and increasingly hydropower too). Fake environmentalists: "We have an existential crisis! We must change our energy strategy to save humanity!" Engineers: "That's quite a problem. Here's a way to solve it. It's called fission. Here are some power plant designs." Fake…

The tone of your post (being simultaneously dismissive and insulting to those who have a different view than you) is very trollish. The problem many people have with nuclear power are things like accidents making areas uninhabitable, radiation making people sick, disposal of waste rods is difficult, some materials can be used to make weapons, and the cost to make a safe plant are staggering and leading to cancellatio…

Renewables have externalities too. Just because it's harder to mass hyterise them, they still exist. Eg the cost of mining for battery parts, parts that are needed to manufacture hundreds of thousands of wind turbines, millions of PV panels, inverters, etc.

That said, of course it's perfectly reasonable to try to preserve some areas, and to put power generation somewhere out of sight.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#87

Post by imtringued »

quotemstr wrote: post #70

Besides: nuclear power plants take up very little space. I really can't seriously people pushing solar, wind, and so on while they eschew nuclear power (and increasingly hydropower too). Fake environmentalists: "We have an existential crisis! We must change our energy strategy to save humanity!" Engineers: "That's quite a problem. Here's a way to solve it. It's called fission. Here are some power plant designs." Fake…

Do you know what? Private industry doesn't care about nuclear. The only way to build nuclear is through government projects which is why there is immense pressure by nuclear companies to publicly dismiss everything that can support itself. Companies set up their own coal plants, natural gas plants, solar farms, wind farms and so on but what they don't do is build their own nuclear plants. Come up with better power plant designs and maybe then private industry will be interested.

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#88

Post by evan_ »

quotemstr wrote: post #69
gdubs wrote: post #46

Our area of Oregon recently banned new solar farms on the grounds that it detracts from the beauty of the landscape – a wine region with lots of tourism. Ironically, that very beauty is threatened by the changing climate, which clean energy could help mitigate.

Let's be real for a second. Climate change isn't going to destroy Oregon's wine-growing regions within our lifetimes. A solar farm will change it within months. You can support or oppose solar farm bans according to your liking, but you should do so on the basis of facts. The two forces aren't even close to equal in magnitude and timing.

I suppose I must be different than you, in that I love my children

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#89

Post by Nextgrid »

Retric wrote: post #19
hirundo wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"if the government were to take over the Sahara Desert, there would be a shortage of sand in five year" -- Milton Friedman (exaggerating, somewhat) Better to put them on home roofs, and arrange for them to be owned by the homeowners, designed so that the occupants are (literally) empowered when the grid is mismanaged, as in California. On highway medians control is more centralized, and they would require more mainte…

Rooftop photovoltaic is currently more expensive, less efficient, and surprisingly dangerous to install. Solar thermal designs actually benefit from being on rooftops. As to dust, economies of scale make a huge difference. It’s rarely worth it, but using a farm truck to spray water across miles of panels is much more efficient than tens of thousands of homeowners doing the same.

What dangers are we talking about? Do solar panels add extra danger compared to just normal roof maintenance work?

Re: Semi-transparent solar panels allow concurrent production of crops and power

#90

Post by conscion »

chrisco255 wrote: post #18

So this technique reduces the sunlight the plants receive by about 57% but only reduces biomass growth by about 30%. It's very interesting. I imagine you could enclose the sides with glass or plastic and make a greenhouse from it. That makes me wonder if the reduction in growth wouldn't be offset by the ability to extend the growing season.

> I imagine you could enclose the sides with glass or plastic and make a greenhouse from it

FTA - that's why they tested on basil and spinach. Both crops are commonly grown in greenhouses

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