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A floating solar power plant on the Strait of Johor in Singapore. Investments in
solar are forecast to surpass spending on oil production for the first time this
year, spurring the push to examine new and sometimes unlikely sites for solar.
Photographer: Bryan van der Beek/Bloomberg
Green
Cleaner Tech
SOLAR FARMS OUT AT SEA ARE CLEAN ENERGY’S NEXT BREAKTHROUGH
Technology for floating panels is expanding beyond lakes and dams to move into
the oceans. China plans huge projects off its eastern coastline.
By
Bloomberg News
July 13, 2023 at 11:00 PM GMT
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Buffeted by waves as high as 10 meters (32 feet) in China’s Yellow Sea about 30
kilometers off the coast of Shandong province, two circular rafts carrying neat
rows of solar panels began generating electricity late last year, a crucial step
toward a new breakthrough for clean energy.
The experiment by State Power Investment Corp., China’s biggest renewable power
developer, and Norway-based developer Ocean Sun AS is one of the most
high-profile tests yet of offshore solar technology. It’s a potential advance in
the sector that would enable locations out at sea to host renewables, and help
land-constrained regions accelerate a transition away from fossil fuels.
State Power Investment Corp. and Ocean Sun ’s floating solar project off the
coast of Shandong province, China.
Source: Ocean Sun
Most initial trials of solar-at-sea have involved small-scale systems, and there
are numerous challenges still to overcome — including higher costs and the
impacts of corrosive salts or destructive winds. Yet developers are increasingly
confident that offshore solar can become a significant new segment in renewable
energy.
“The application of this is virtually unlimited,” because many regions have
constraints on the use of land, including parts of Europe, Africa and Asia along
with locations like Singapore and Hong Kong, said Ocean Sun’s Chief Executive
Officer Børge Bjørneklett. “In these places, you see there’s a huge interest for
this technology.”
Shandong, the industrial hub south of Beijing, plans to add more than 11
gigawatts of solar offshore by 2025, and to ultimately build 42 gigawatts, more
than the current power generation capacity of Norway. Neighboring Jiangsu has a
target to add 12.7 gigawatts, while provinces like Fujian and Tianjin are also
studying proposals. Japan, the Netherlands and Malaysia are among other nations
conducting or preparing test projects.
Floating panels at the Canoe Brook water treatment plant in Short Hills, New
Jersey.
Photographer: Bing Guan/Bloomberg
Even with investments in solar forecast to surpass spending on oil production
for the first time this year, many regions face challenges in finding land to
install vast arrays of panels, either because of a lack of available space, as a
result of inhospitable terrain, or because to do so would require
deforestation.
That’s spurring the push to examine new, and sometimes unlikely, sites for solar
that’s already seen hundreds of floating projects delivered on lakes,
reservoirs, fish farms and dams. Japan has dozens of smaller arrays, China and
India have added major operations, and facilities have been built in nations
including Colombia, Israel and Ghana. In January, the largest floating solar
project in the US was brought fully online, supplying enough power for 1,400
homes from panels at the Canoe Brook water treatment plant in New Jersey.
“Renewables installation must grow, but the realistic question is where to
build,” said Li Xiang, head of the solar-on-water unit at Hefei, China-based
Sungrow Power Supply Co., one of the world’s largest renewable energy equipment
makers. “We think water surfaces have great potential.”
Stretched out across the dark green water of an artificial lake in Huainan, in
China’s eastern Anhui province, is an installation of about half a million
floating solar panels clustered into vast blocks, with white geese swimming by.
The project built by Sungrow, on the site of a former coal mine since filled
with water, covers the size of more than 400 soccer pitches and generates power
for more than 100,000 homes.
A project of about half a million floating solar panels was built on the site of
a former coal mine filled with water in Huainan, China.
Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg
The installation covers the size of more than 400 soccer pitches and generates
power for more than 100,000 homes.
Photographer: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg
Adding solar systems on existing reservoirs could theoretically allow more than
6,000 global cities and communities to develop self-sufficient power systems,
researchers including Zeng Zhenzhong, an associate professor at Southern
University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen, said in a paper published in
March. “We don’t need to fight for farmlands, nor do we need to cut forests or
even go to the deserts,” Zeng said in an interview.
Yet more assessments are needed of the potential long-term consequences of
covering water bodies with panels, the researchers found. China’s authorities
have become wary too. New developments in some freshwater locations were banned
last May amid concerns about the impacts on ecosystems and flood control. A
solar installation in Jiangsu province that covered 70% of a lake’s surface was
partially dismantled after local officials raised objections.
Floating solar panels on the Hapcheon Dam in Hapcheon, South Korea.
Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
While solar plants on freshwater sites are forecast to continue to expand
globally, some of those concerns — and the potential of projects at sea — are
helping to drive activity in the offshore sector. China’s Ministry of Science
and Technology has made it a key priority to develop near-shore floating
technologies by 2025, while companies such as Sungrow are among those
collaborating with researchers.
Ocean-based solar arrays that can handle waves of up to four meters could be
ready for commercial deployment within a year, and systems able to withstand
10-meter high swells will take at least three years to perfect, according to
Ocean Sun. Viable technology could be ready within one to two years, according
to Southern University’s Zeng, who is also studying offshore developments.
Developers are experimenting with differing concepts. Ocean Sun’s ring-shaped
floaters, made of high-density plastic pipes and a membrane with panels laid out
across the surface, undulate with the movement of waves. Rotterdam-based
SolarDuck AS mounts panels on triangular platforms and has agreements to test
its systems, including in Tokyo Bay and in a project off the coast of Tioman
Island in Malaysia.
Workers prepare a floating solar farm for use at a reservoir in Alqueva,
Portugal.
Photographer: Goncalo Fonseca/Bloomberg
Questions remain about the ultimate scale of the offshore solar market.
Developing panels at sea could be around 40% more expensive thanks to more
complex installations and costly subsea cables, according to BloombergNEF
estimates. Unlike offshore wind, which produces more power than onshore farms
because of stronger gusts and larger turbines, there’s no major benefit to power
generation in harvesting the sun’s rays at sea versus land.
“Offshore solar in some ways is the worst of both worlds,” said Cosimo Ries, an
analyst with Trivium China. “You get the higher installation costs, but you
don’t get the higher power output.” Solar-at-sea is likely to end up a niche
sector, mostly serving land-starved coastal cities like Singapore, Ries said.
Advocates insist the technology is fast improving, and will win a role in
helping nations with large populations and a lack of land to curb emissions and
— for many developing economies — to meet still rising energy demand.
Longi Green Energy Technology Co., the world’s biggest producer of panels, is
developing modules specifically suited for conditions at sea, and has a
study underway in Jiangsu province. While it sees the market size as limited
now, there’s “relatively large potential for offshore solar,” the company
said in a March conference presentation in Xiamen.
Floating solar panels on the sea in Goheung, South Korea. Developing panels at
sea could be around 40% more expensive thanks to more complex installations and
costly subsea cables, according to BloombergNEF estimates.
Photographer: SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg
China alone has potential to host about 700 gigawatts of offshore solar — about
as much as the combined electricity generation capacity of India and Japan —
according to a State Power Investment forecast.
“It is not going to be difficult,” said Southern University’s Zeng. “People have
not yet realized how much potential it has.”
— Dan Murtaugh and Luz Ding contributed to this report.
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