Canal Top Solar Power Plant: An untapped potential that can avoid climate disaster

Why choose Canal Top solar power plant?
The recently concluded OP 27 in Egypt has made it clear to most of the world’s leaders the existence of humankind. Our civilisation is at stake unless we take every possible step to significantly reduce carbon dioxide emissions and eventually achieve net zero emissions within the next few decades. Solar energy is currently the most effective and feasible tool for achieving net zero emissions because it can be used directly for the generation of pollution-free electricity, the heating and cooling of space and various other items, green hydrogen production, and a variety of other applications. It is thus imperative to utilise whatever solar energy is available in a particular place for various applications. This is ideally in tune with what Mother Nature is doing daily to save Mother Earth.
Cities and towns in a country are the most crowded places, and transport is most intensive here, leading to very high CO2 emissions. On the other hand, land is relatively scarce and highly expensive. Therefore, rooftop solar plants have become widely popular in cities and towns. Another option, which is relatively untapped in these places, is the use of canals and other water bodies for solar power plants.

SCOPE OF CANAL TOP SPV POWER PLANT IN INDIA
This has been recognised by MNRE long before, and the potential for canal tops and canal banks for the installation of solar power plants in India has been estimated as follows:
• Considering around 20 percent of the total length of all canals as having potential for solar power generation, the active length for solar power generation will be 1312 km.
• The width of a canal greatly impacts the unit production cost of the canal-top solar PV power plant. The width of these canals ranges from 110 metres to 10 meters.
Hence, an approximate aggregate capacity that can be installed on the canals is 2.6 GW, considering an average width of 20 m. Fewer than 100 MW of canal-top solar power plants have been installed in India.
MNRE also declared in 2014 a promotional policy for Canal Top Solar power as follows:
Ministry of New & Renewable Energy will provide Central Financial Assistance of
• ₹ 3 Crore (0.44 Million US$)/MW or 30 percent of the Project Cost whichever is lower for the Canal TopSolar PV Projects.
• ₹ 1.5 Crore (0.33 Million US$) /MW or 30 percent of the Project Cost whichever is lower for Canal Bank Solar PV Projects. Whether this is still valid is not known to us.
Merits of canal-top solar power plants:
• Requires less area than the ground mounted or rooftop SPP as the provision of pitch surface area is zero in canal top SPP since there is no problem of shading in these SPP.
• A canal-top solar PV power plant generates electricity, avoiding any adverse effect on the existing water body under the plant.
• This type of solar PV plant installation reduces the evaporation of water. Many of the canals that are used for irrigation get dried up due to excessive water evaporation during the summer. Coverage of solar panels in canal top SPP prevents canal drying. A rough estimate indicates that a savings of about 60 to 90 million cubic metres per year due to reduced evaporation loss is possible through the implementation of Canal Top SPP in India. This is also equivalent to 96 to 144 million units of electricity, which otherwise would have been consumed to fetch this much water from canals.
• The canal water can easily be used for cleaning solar panels, and the water after cleaning modules is returned to the canal again. Water recycling for cleaning can be done almost daily since water is available free of cost and recycled using a canal as a reservoir. Thus, the dust-induced degradation of solar power plants, which can result in a 10-20 percent loss of power, can be avoided in canal-top SPP.
• A canal-top solar PV power plant allows for less module heating, resulting in more generations than any other rooftop or ground-mounted solar PV power plant. This is because the back surface area is sufficient for natural air circulation over the water body.

However, the initial capital cost per watt of Canal Top SPP is higher than a common ground mounted or rooftop SPP since the module mounting structure and its associated civil cost are higher.
Expertise shared by Prof. Hiranmay Saha Chairman, AGNI Green Power Ltd.
For more details https://www.agnipower.com/