ALKEVA, Portugal, May 9 (Reuters) – Two tugs moved a huge set of 12,000 solar panels the size of four football fields until they docked at Portugal’s Alkeva reservoir in preparation for the launch of Europe’s largest floating solar park in July.
Built by the country’s main company EDP (EDP.LS) on the largest artificial lake in Western Europe, the sleek floating island is part of Portugal’s plan to reduce its dependence on imported fossil fuels, which have risen since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Blessed by long hours of sunshine and Atlantic winds, Portugal has accelerated its transition to renewables. But although Portugal uses almost no Russian hydrocarbons, its gas-fired power plants are still under pressure from rising fuel prices.
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Miguel Patena, director of the EDP group in charge of the solar project, said on Thursday, when the tugs moved the panels to the position that the electricity produced by the floating fleet with an installed capacity of 5 megawatts (MW) will cost one third of that produced by gas installation.
The panels of the Alqueva tank, which is used to generate hydropower, will produce 7.5 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity per year and will be supplemented by lithium batteries to store 2 GWh.
The solar panels will supply 1,500 families with energy, or a third of the needs of the nearby towns of Moura and Portel.
Aerial view of EDP’s largest floating solar farm (Energias de Portugal) on a dam in Europe, on the surface of Alkeva Dam, in Moura, Portugal, 5 May 2022. REUTERS / Miguel Pereira
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“This project is the largest floating solar park in a water dam in Europe, it is a very good benchmark,” Patena said.
Solar panels mounted on pontoons in lakes or at sea have been installed in various locations from California to polluted industrial lakes in China in the fight to reduce CO2 emissions.
Floating panels do not require valuable real estate, and those on tanks used for hydropower are particularly cost-effective as they can be connected to existing grid connections. Excess energy generated on sunny days can pump water into the pond to be stored for use on cloudy days or at night.
EDP executive board member Ana Paula Marquez says the war in Ukraine has shown the need to speed up the transition to renewables
She said the Alqueva project was part of EDP’s strategy to “become 100% green by 2030”, with hydropower and other renewables now accounting for 78% of EDP’s 25.6 GW installed capacity.
In 2017, EDP installed a pilot floating solar project with 840 panels at Alto Rabagao Dam, the first in Europe to test how hydro and solar energy can complement each other.
EDP already has plans to expand the Alqueva project. In April, it secured the right to build a second floating farm with an installed capacity of 70 MW.
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Report by Sergio Goncalves; Edited by Andrei Khalip and Edmund Blair
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