The Portuguese reservoir Alqueva is the home to the biggest floating solar park in Europe and it will take shape this July.
The two tugboats are moving the 12000 solar panels that are the size of four football fields to the mooring on the reservoir.
This floating solar park is built by EDP, the main utility company in Portugal. It’s located on the biggest artificial lake in the west of Europe.
This shiny and floating island is part of the Portuguese plan to reduce their dependence on imported fossil fuel whose price has spiked since the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Portugal: Amazing Country to Benefit from Renewable Sources of Energy
Portugal is blessed by long hours of sunlight and Atlantic winds so they’ve sped up their change to renewables. Although the country uses almost zero hydrocarbons from Russia; the gas-fired power plants are still feeling the increase in fuel prices.
According to the director of EDP who’s also the head of the solar project, Miguel Patena, the electricity made from this floating park, with a capacity of 5 MW, will cost one-third of that which comes from gas-fired plants.
The panels of this reservoir that are used to generate hydropower would make 7.5 GWh of electricity yearly and lithium batteries will be used to store 2 GWh.
Thanks to this solar power park, 1500 families will be supplied with power or a third of the needs of the citizens in nearby Portel and Moura.
The Largest Solar Park on a Hydro Dam in Europe
According to Patena, this is the biggest floating solar park in a hydro dam on European soil and this is a solid benchmark.
The panels, mounted on pontoons on lakes or at the sea, were installed in different places from California to Chinese industrial ponds in an effort to decrease the emissions of CO2.
The floating solar farm doesn’t need real estate and the ones built on reservoirs are cost effective due to them being attached to the current links to the power network.
Surplus power produced on sunny days will help pump water up into the lake where it will be stored for usage on cloudy days or at night.
This project is part of the EDP goal to go 100 percent green by 2030. Hydropower and other renewables are 78 percent of the 25.6 GW installed capacity.
The expansion of this project is already in motion. They’ve secured building permission for another floating farm with 70 MW of capacity.
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