A brand new pilot program might deal with two climate-related points within the Golden State.
The California Division of Water Sources is funding a $20 million pilot program to put in photo voltaic panels over the state’s water provide canals. The mission goals to cut back the quantity of water that evaporates, exacerbating the state’s historic drought, whereas the photo voltaic panels generate renewable vitality, a information launch stated.
“That is an thrilling mission,” Wade Crowfoot, California Pure Sources Secretary, stated in a press release. “It ties our efforts in California to enhance water conservation and construct drought resilience to the clear vitality transition we’re driving throughout California.”
The pilot program will embrace water channels in Central California. Not too long ago, the Los Angeles Metropolis Council voted to contemplate funding the same LA Aqueduct mission, KCRW reported.
The idea of this system resulted from analysis performed by Photo voltaic AquaGrid, a mission growth firm primarily based within the Bay Space. A UC Merced environmental engineering alumna, Brandi McKuin, was one of many researchers on the preliminary mission.
The analysis crew discovered that “overlaying 4,000 miles of California’s water channels might scale back evaporation by as much as 82%, saving about 63 billion gallons of water yearly,” in response to a information launch from at UC Merced.
That quantity of water is roughly the identical quantity wanted to “irrigate 50,000 hectares of farmland or meet the residential water wants of greater than 2 million individuals.”
The researchers counsel that if all of the water canals within the state had been coated with photo voltaic panels, about 13 gigawatts of renewable energy could possibly be generated, the information launch stated.
This necessary step can even assist the state meet its 2030 local weather targets.
The Turlock Irrigation District in Northern California will break floor on the mission early subsequent yr, a information launch from the California Division of Water Sources stated.
