ISES + GSC Webinar: Floating Solar Photovoltaics
On 28 May 2020 at 2PM GMT/UTC, the International Solar Energy Society is happy to present this webinar on floating solar photovoltaics in collaboration with the Global Solar Council (GSC).
Floating solar photovoltaics, or FPV, are an emerging concept that make use of a portion of surface water bodies for siting grid-tied solar energy systems. As PV system prices fall and reliability improves, there is more and more pressure to find suitable sites for grid-tied centralized systems, especially in areas where land use is a critical restraint, and FPV offers an attractive alternative to land-based systems. This webinar will provide an overview by FPV experts of recent work that has been done to assess the global and regional FPV potentials, and testing of system concepts, and present examples of successful projects already in place.
The webinar will last for 2 hours and include presentations from international experts on the topic of floating solar photovoltaics and will also include a 30 min Q/A session for the audience!
ISES and the GSC
Founded in 2015, the Global Solar Council (GSC) is an international non-profit association of the national, regional and international associations in solar energy and the world‘s leading corporations. To support its mission of solar energy as the leading solution to the world’s energy needs, the GSC offers programs in regulatory policy, trade policy, new market opening as well as jobs and skills training.
ISES is one of the founding members of the GSC, and has a seat on its Board of Directors. ISES also chairs the Council’s Technology Committee.
Webinar presentations
Speakers
Zuzana Dobrotkova
Zuzana Dobrotkova is a Senior Energy Specialist in the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP) of the World Bank where she leads Solar Scale-Up Program and contributes to various renewables and energy storage initiatives. Before joining the World Bank, Zuzana worked for the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and for the International Energy Agency (IEA). Zuzana’s areas of expertise include renewable energy markets and policies, power sector modelling, energy accounting and statistics. In recent years Zuzana’s main focus has been solar energy and energy storage, including the preparation of several large-scale solar projects with storage in West Africa. Zuzana is from Slovakia and she holds an MSc in Mathematics from Comenius University in Bratislava, and an MA and a PhD in Economics from the Center for Economic Research and Graduate Education in Prague.
Zuzana will be introduce floating solar from a global perspective.
Sika Gadzanku
Sika Gadzanku is an energy technology and policy researcher at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, Colorado. Her work involves providing technical assistance to international partners on grid integration of renewable energy and supporting the REopt team in conducting renewable energy screenings and evaluating renewable energy and storage deployment potential. Her research experience includes climate change impacts on hydropower in Sub-Saharan Africa, waste-to-energy technologies, and power systems planning efforts in Ghana and Nigeria. She also has professional experience in energy consulting and distilling complex technical information to policymakers and the public. Sika holds an MSc in Technology and Policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a BSc in Chemical Engineering from Tufts University.
Sika will present an overview of NREL research and initial findings on floating solar.
Thomas Reindl
Thomas REINDL is Deputy CEO of the Solar Energy Research Institute of Singapore (SERIS) and Principal Research Fellow at the National University of Singapore (NUS).
He started with photovoltaics (PV) in 1992 at the SIEMENS Corporate R&D Labs. After holding several management positions at SIEMENS and running one of the leading German PV systems integration companies as Chief Operating Officer, he joined SERIS in 2010 and soon became Director of the Solar Energy System cluster. During his time at SERIS, he won public research grants in excess of SGD 20million, founded 2 spin-off companies and authored strategic scientific papers such as the "PV Roadmap for Singapore".
Dr. Reindl holds a Master in Chemistry, a Ph.D. in Natural Sciences and an MBA from INSEAD, all awarded with highest honors. His research interest are high-performance PV and embedded systems, technoeconomic road-mapping and the reliable integration of renewable energies into power systems. He is also the Principal Investigator for the world’s largest Floating PV testbed, located in Singapore.
Thomas will present key learnings from the world's largest test-bed for floating PV.
David Renné
Dr. Renné served as President of the International Solar Energy Society from 2010 - 2019. From 1991 until his retirement in 2012, Dr. Renné managed the solar resource assessment activities at the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). In 2012 he formed the consultancy Dave Renne Renewables. He is dedicated to the concept of urgently achieving 100% renewable energy to meet all of our end use energy requirements as the best solution to the climate crisis.
Dave will give the opening remarks and welcome to the webinar for ISES and GSC.
Eicke Weber
Professor Weber is Past Vice President of ISES and acting Chair of the European Solar Manufacturing Councile ESMC. Till mid-2018 he was CEO of the Berkeley Alliance for Research in Singapore, BEARS. Till the end of 2016 he was Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems ISE and Professor for Physics / Solar Energy at the Albert-Ludwigs-University of Freiburg, Germany. Prof. Weber studied Physics at the University of Cologne, Germany where he made his doctorate in 1976 and his habilitation in 1983. From 1983-2006 he lectured at the faculty of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering of the University of California, Berkeley - since 1991 as Professor of Materials Science. The topic of Prof. Weber's own research is semiconductor materials science for photovoltaic and microelectronic applications.
Eicke will moderate the webinar and lead the Q/A session.
Ki-hae Yang
Dr Yang is founder of Solar Environment Great Innovation and former Chairman of the floating solar task force by the CBC (CleanTech Business Club Network) as well as former Chairman of CBC Korea. He has been engaged with environmental causes for 35 years fighting climate change and for human rights, holding more than 50 patents, i.e. on floating solar with purification and reflection systems for dual modules.
Dr. Yang will present on the future technologies of floating solar.