Times Colonist

Solar panels floated on reservoir to power water treatment plant

- WAYNE PARRY

New Jersey’s Canoe Brook Water Treatment plant produces 14 million gallons of drinking water a day.

Each one of those gallons weighs about eight pounds, so it’s quickly apparent that a large amount of energy is needed to move water from a reservoir to the treatment plant and into the 84,000 homes and businesses that the New Jersey American Water Company serves in the area.

So the water utility partnered with NJR Clean Energy Ventures, the renewable energy subsidiary of the natural gas firm New Jersey Resources, for a solution.

NJR Clean Energy Ventures built a vast array of solar panels, linked them together, and placed them on the surface of the water at Canoe Brook Reservoir.

The companies say the 17-acre solar array, consisting of 16,510 solar panels, is the largest floating solar array in North America — about twice the size of the next-largest facility, an array of floating panels on a body of water in Sayreville, New Jersey, owned by that municipali­ty.

The Millburn facility, which began operating in January, produces 8.9 megawatts of electricit­y, enough to power 1,400 homes.

But the power doesn’t go to residentia­l customers. Instead, it provides 95% of the water treatment plant’s substantia­l energy requiremen­ts.

“It takes a lot of energy to pump that water,” said Mark McDonough, president of New Jersey American Water. “When we can use a cleaner, greener, more efficient energy source, we want to seize that opportunit­y.”

Long popular in Asia, floating solar arrays are starting to catch on in the U.S.

A study published in the journal Nature Sustainabi­lity in March found that thousands of cities — more than 6,000 in 124 countries — could generate an amount equal to all their electricit­y demand using floating solar, making it a climate solution to be taken seriously.

Neither company would say how much it cost to build the New Jersey solar facility, although Robert Pohlman, vice president of NJR Clean Energy Ventures, said, “It’s a project that makes a lot of sense for both organizati­ons.”

The Sayreville solar array, which is about half the size of the one in Millburn, cost $7.2 million to build, according to RETTEW, the Lancaster, Pennsylvan­iabased company that built it.

Shawn LaTourette, New Jersey’s environmen­tal protection commission­er, said the project enables the companies “to chip away at the rather considerab­le energy use of our water systems.”

Because salt water corrodes the equipment, floating solar arrays are generally placed on human-made bodies of fresh water such as reservoirs or holding basins for water treatment plants.

Putting solar panels atop plastic floats that are moored to the bottom of the reservoir helps reduce evaporatio­n of water into the air, and the temperatur­e of the water helps cool the solar panels, enabling them to work more efficientl­y, officials said.

 ?? WAYNE PARRY, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ?? Solar panels from a project at a water treatment plant in Millburn, New Jersey, provide enough electricit­y to power 95 per cent of the treatment facility’s electrical needs.
WAYNE PARRY, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Solar panels from a project at a water treatment plant in Millburn, New Jersey, provide enough electricit­y to power 95 per cent of the treatment facility’s electrical needs.

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