Brazil inaugurates its first floating solar generation plant



The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, participated on Monday in the opening ceremony of the country's first solar power floating plant, an 11,000 square meter platform with 3,972 solar panels, supported by floats and capable of generating a megawatt of energy.

The innovative platform is anchored in a hydroelectric dam of the state-owned Hydroelectric Company of San Francisco (Chesf) in Sobradinho, a municipality in the interior of the state of Bahia (northeast of Brazil).

This is a pilot project to determine the feasibility of using this type of solar plants in the many dams and lagoons of the country's hydroelectric plants because they have the advantage that it is not necessary to expropriate or buy land for installation.

Another advantage is that they can use the same substations and transmission lines of hydroelectric plants to connect to the national electricity system, so it is not necessary to invest in the laying of new power lines.

They also take advantage of the water in the lagoon for cooling their systems and the ability of water mirrors to attract more solar radiation, and help prevent further evaporation of water in hydroelectric plants that depend on rain cycles.

The inaugurated platform is the first of a set that will be installed at the Sobradinho dam and that until next year, with the installation of a second plant, it will have the capacity to generate 2.5 megawatts of energy.

The investment in the two plants was 56 million reais (about 14.4 million dollars) by the state power company Eletrobras, whose president, Wilson Ferreira Júnior, also participated in the opening ceremony, as well as the Minister of Mines and Energy, Banto Costa Lima Silva.

The inaugurated platform has a cable system to anchor it in the dam that allows it to accompany the level of the lagoon and withstand the currents and winds, as well as a float system capable of supporting all the equipment and workers that will operate it .

"Without energy we have no conditions to grow. That is why this new way of looking for energy with photovoltaic panels on top of a lagoon is welcome in Brazil," Bolsonaro said in his statement at the event.

"The information I received is that if we use the entire extension of the Sobradinho dam (4.2 square kilometers) to install floating solar panels we can generate 60 times the energy produced by the hydroelectric plant itself (1,050 megawatts)," he added.

According to the Government, in addition to raising the energy potential of the entire San Francisco River Integration Project, calculated at 3.5 gigawatts, floating solar power plants can produce the energy needed to pump water from the river that is diverted to some of the most arid regions of the country at a cost of 77 million dollars annually.

"This burning soil and this abundant heat are the ones that will generate the energy for the engines that irrigate those arid areas," Bolsonaro said.

. (tagsToTranslate) Brazil (t) inaugurates (t) first (t) floating (t) generation



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