The Aswan High Dam Reservoir is among the largest water reservoirs on the planet and suffers from excessive water evaporation charges because of the area’s scorching and dry local weather. Floating PV installations is usually a treatment, whereas additionally providing a very good match for hydropower era.
An worldwide analysis workforce analyzed the consequences of the set up of floating photovoltaics (FPV) within the Aswan High Dam Reservoir (AHDR) in Egypt. Using numerical evaluation, they accounted for the potential energy era of the FPV plant, along with the evaporation discount offered.
“This examine examines the advantages of an FPV system over 12 years, from 2005 to 2016, in AHDR,” they stated. “We are additionally exploring totally different situations for filling the Aswan High Dam’s (AHD’s) hydropower with FPV and utilizing the additional water for reservoir administration or irrigation.”
AHD was constructed within the Nineteen Sixties, supplying an annual hydropower era of 10,000 GWh. Effectively, the dam additionally created the AHDR, one of many largest man-made reservoirs on the planet. The total reservoir extends for about 500 km alongside the Nile River; 330 km of it’s in Egypt, the place it’s referred to as Lake Nasser, and 170 km is in Sudan, the place it’s named Lake Nubia. Its complete space is 6,000 km2 and it has a storage capability of 169 billion cubic meters (BCM). However, evaporation charges are excessive because of the area’s scorching and dry local weather.
For their investigation, the scientists believed to construct a FPV plant within the reservoir with panel protection of 0%, 10%, 45%, and 90% of the lake. “According to the International Energy Agency (2020), the annual electrical energy consumption of the African continent is 715.6 TWh. To cowl it by way of FPV in AHDR, 45% occupancy of FPV is sufficient. The funding value (CAPEX) of such a undertaking might be roughly $14.6 billion,” they stated.
To mannequin the installations, the teachers used the hydrodynamic General Lake Model, a vertical 1D mannequin that represents the hydrodynamic processes of standing water our bodies. They admit tilt angles of 12 levels or 30 levels, utilizing LONGi LR4 modules, with a row distance of 1.44 m. In the case of 90% FPV protection, the put in capability calculated is 735 GW.
“To estimate the contribution of an FPV system in AHDR to the vitality provide in Egypt, we calculated the electrical energy yield utilizing the simulation software program Zenit,” defined the group. “The simulations are evaluated by way of {the electrical} yield of the facility plant and the efficiency ratio.”
The simulation outcomes present that, within the case of 0% panel protection, which is the present state of affairs, the cumulative annual lack of water to evaporation from 10.65 to 13.17 BCM. The complete evaporation loss in 2005–2016 was 141.6 BCM, whereas the imply annual loss was 11.8 BCM, and the imply evaporation charge per day was 6.5 mm.
If 10% of the lake is roofed by FPV, a complete of seven.2 BCM might be saved in 12 years, whereas if 45% is roofed, 33.7 BCM might be saved. “The most cumulative water storage for a 90% occupancy FPV within the 12-year examine interval reached 70.4 BCM, amounting to an annual water storage of 5.9 BCM and a diminished evaporation loss by 49.7%,” added the analysis workforce.
In addition, the teachers discovered that, at 90% protection and a tilt angle of 30 levels, the utmost annual yield of the FPV system could be 1,431 TWh, with a efficiency ratio of 78.7%. That rises barely to 1,459 TWh and a efficiency ratio of 80.8% within the case of a 12-degree tilt angle.
After the calculations, the workforce analyzed three situations for the usage of water saved from evaporation. In the primary situation, it will likely be used to generate extra hydropower within the current plant; within the second, it’s believed to assist replenish the Toshka Lakes; and within the final situation, the additional water is used on the Mubarak Pumping Station for the irrigation of farms in Bagong Walog, an space that stretches between Toshka Lakes and the AHDR.
“Constant withdrawal of water for irrigation throughout FPV occupation is taken into account most favorable. Depending on FPV occupation, between 7.35 and eight.07 BCM of irrigation water could be provided yearly, with a most of 16 BCM spilled into Toshka Lakes,” the researchers concluded.
The evaluation is offered within the examine “Evaporation discount and vitality manufacturing potential utilizing floating photovoltaic energy vegetation within the Aswan High Dam Reservoir,” revealed in Journal of Hydrological Sciences. The analysis group was fashioned by scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE) in Germany and the University of Freiburg, in addition to the University of Wisconsin-Madison within the United States.
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