{"id":32064,"date":"2023-05-09T17:03:00","date_gmt":"2023-05-09T21:03:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=32064"},"modified":"2023-05-09T17:03:03","modified_gmt":"2023-05-09T21:03:03","slug":"duke-energy-is-building-a-floating-solar-farm-on-a-cooling-pond-in-bartow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2023\/05\/09\/duke-energy-is-building-a-floating-solar-farm-on-a-cooling-pond-in-bartow\/","title":{"rendered":"Duke Energy is building a floating solar farm on a cooling pond in Bartow"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Duke Energy has begun construction on a floating solar project at its Hines Energy Complex in Bartow.  <\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The two-acre pilot on the water will include 1,800\u00a0solar modules that can produce nearly 1 megawatt of electricity and\u00a0about 1 million kilowatt-hours annually.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The floating array at 7700 County Road 555 in Bartow will be installed starting this month on an existing 1,200-acre cooling pond, which was once a phosphate mining pit. At peak output, the array could generate enough electricity to power nearly 100 local homes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At a groundbreaking on Monday, Shayna White, Duke\u2019s Florida project manager, said the small-scale pilot on Duke Property will be a test to determine if the technology behind floating solar arrays has better efficiency and capabilities than land-based solar farms.\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cThe water should have a cooling effect to help them operate more efficiently,\u201d White said, explaining cooler solar panels are more efficient energy producers.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cWe’re also doing bifacial modules so they’ll be picking up energy from the top and the bottom of the module as the Sun is reflecting off the water,\u201c she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOn a larger scale, it would in theory decrease evaporation in the pond\u201d because the panels shade the water from sunlight, but she only expects that to be a small impact with this small of a pilot array. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The solar modules will rest on rectangular floating dock-like bases, she said. The solar panels will be fixed and facing south as they collect sunlight. They should be producing power by mid-July to early-August.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe cooling pond is essentially a radiator for the plant. It\u2019s a great place to start a pilot project like this,\u201d said Tommy Oneal, Duke Energy Florida\u2019s environmental specialist.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The construction phase of the project will employ about 15 workers for up to six months.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re excited to get hands-on experience with Duke Energy Florida\u2019s first floating solar project at one of our own power plant sites,\u201d said Melissa Seixas, Duke Energy Florida state president, in a recent press release.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Duke Energy has begun construction on a floating solar project at its Hines Energy Complex in Bartow.   The two-acre pilot on the water will include 1,800\u00a0solar modules that can… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}