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WEBINAR: UC Davis Wild Energy Center – Impacts of Floating Photovoltaic Solar Energy on Water Bodies
November 10, 2023 @ 5:00 pm - 6:30 pm CST
Impacts of Floating Photovoltaic Solar Energy on Water Bodies
Friday, November 10, 2023
5:00PM – 6:30PM CST
You can also attend this talk in-person in Room 3001 in UC Davis’s Plant and Environmental Sciences Building (PES).
Alex Cagle is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Energy Graduate Group at UC Davis and the Wild Energy Center.
During this talk, Alex will discuss his empirical research on the impacts of floating solar PV installations (FPV) on host water bodies’ thermal dynamics and water quality parameters. Over the course of his Ph.D. research, Alex spent hundreds of hours on FPVs across the United States to better understand how this renewable energy technology impacts the local environment.
The first portion of the talk describes impacts of FPVs on host water body temperature and dissolved oxygen. Specifically, this work evaluates how shading conferred by FPVs alters diel and seasonal heating of host water bodies and how this shading may impact biological processes. The second portion of this talk will discuss in-situ impacts of FPVs on major water quality parameters and algae indicators. This body of research explains how FPVs alter algae growth beneath the array versus in open areas of the same water body. These two projects, comprising the last two chapters of his Ph.D., provide insight into how this unique form of solar energy may benefit local environments while advancing the transition to a zero- emission electric sector.
Alex Cagle has been published in Frontiers in Sustainability, Sustainability, and Environmental Science & Technology, among other journals, and was selected for the American Geophysical Union’s Voices for Science Program.
