Feasibility study of floating solar panels on a hydropower reservoir with winter ice

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Insinööritieteiden korkeakoulu | Master's thesis
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Date

2024-05-20

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Cold Climate Engineering

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Degree programme

Nordic Master's Programme in Cold Climate Engineering

Language

en

Pages

69+9

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Abstract

This project has been done because of the need of increasing the production of renewable energy in the Nordics. As solar energy is one of the easy options to go with, company are searching for a way of installing solar farms in areas that they already own. As hydropower reservoirs offer a large area, it has become an interesting option for these companies. Furthermore, floating solar panels technology has been greatly developed during the last years, making this option even more appealing. On the other hand, the fact that the reservoir freezes in winter creates some extra challenges that will need to be dealt with. Some of these challenges come from depth change in the reservoir, the forces that can appear towards the reservoir dam because of the wind drag on the solar panels and the extra difficulty of designing systems with unknown parameters due to the lack of proper ice data. Some of the forces that can be produced, such as the ones caused by the thermal stress or the increased drag because of the wind hitting the solar panels, have been estimated by using a self-developed tool, and some recommendations for the systems, as well as future research that would need to be done before engaging in the system construction have been explained. The main conclusion of this study is that the installation of a floating solar panel system seems technically feasible. Both, the ice forces from the wind drag and from thermal expansions seem to be acceptable, even though some of the environmental data is uncertain. Part of this uncertainty comes from the unknown way in which the floating panels themselves covering most of the water surface will alter the ice conditions. Together with some of the systems such as mooring, and joints will need to be further studied to prove the technical feasibility of the whole project. Furthermore, the economic feasibility of the system, that has not been checked, could completely change the decision of the interested company on moving forward with the project, as some of the components may not be commercially available due to the special requirements because of the cold.

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Supervisor

Tuhkuri, Jukka

Thesis advisor

Høyland, Knut Vilhelm

Keywords

solar energy, floating solar panels, feasibility study, ice actions

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-202405263658

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[dipl] Insinööritieteiden korkeakoulu / ENG