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BP solar firm leads search for UK's most reflective ground

Published by , Editorial Assistant
Energy Global,


BP’s solar subsidiary is on the hunt for Britain’s shiniest grass to help make the most of new double-sided solar panels that can harness light reflected off the ground, The Guardian has reported.

Lightsource BP hopes the ‘bifacial’ solar panels will boost the amount of renewable energy generated at its solar farms and could make them more economic in gloomier parts of Northern Ireland and Scotland. At a test site outside Belfast, the company found that the bifacial panels can increase electricity output by almost 15%, and can be much higher if the ground beneath the panel is particularly reflective.

The company is using the findings from its experiment to work with a seed company in Norfolk to find the ‘most reflective’ grass type to grow underneath the solar panels.

Chris Buckland, the technical director of Lightsource BP, said the team tested the panels for almost a year on ‘lush Northern Irish grass’, which helped to reflect light on to the back-facing panels. The grass helped to produce an extra 14% of electricity, he said.

The same panels positioned over white floorboards produced almost 30% more electricity than traditional panels and once the floorboards were removed to reveal dried, brown grass the output plummeted to “low single-digits”, he continued.

Buckland believes that most customers will want to keep grass beneath their panels, rather than boards or gravel, which would require occasional cleaning. “We’re working with a seed company in Norfolk to trial test fields of different grass types to find a species of grass with the most solar potential to recommend to our customers,” he said.

“What will be important is that the grass stays green throughout the year. We are fortunate here in the UK because the grass is a perennial variety and quite tightly packed.

“What we don’t know at this stage is whether the best grass will prove to be a wide-blade cattle grazing grass or a finer golf course variety. We’re not there yet.”

The company hopes to use the new solar technology advances to install solar projects in less sunny areas because the two-faced panels work particularly well in cooler climates.

In a trial, the company is using ‘tracker panels’ that tilt throughout the day to follow the track of the sun, which are “very useful in sunnier areas”. The London-based solar company, which BP holds a 43% stake in, is expanding after it won the BP’s backing in 2017.

Read the article online at: https://www.energyglobal.com/special-reports/10072019/bp-solar-firm-leads-search-for-uks-most-reflective-ground/

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