Feasibility of Solar Farm Installation on MTR Sites
Document Type
Panel Presentation
Keywords
Solar Power, Mountaintop Removal, Cost Effectiveness
Biography
I'm a student currently attending Marshall University and am planning on graduating in May. Over the past couple of years, I've read and studied the impact of Mountaintop removal in my home state of West Virginia and the controversy surrounding it. This project came about as an idea of taking this terrible issue and making something good out of this. In this case, it is a whole new industry that has the potential of bringing new money into a state in need of it.
Major
Geography (Meteorology Emphasis)
Advisor for this project
Dr. Jonathan Kozar
Abstract
Climate change is a major issue that has spread politically and has brought up debates on whether we should move on to more renewable sources of energy such as wind and solar. However, this move has historically been inhibited by the higher costs of these energy sources as well as the issue of finding suitable land to construct these wind and solar farms. In recent years, though, the costs of both of these renewable energy sources, especially solar have decreased significantly, making the construction of large scale solar farms more feasible as time goes on. Furthermore, here in the state of West Virginia, there exist tracts of land where there would be little conflict in constructing these farms: Mountaintop Removal (MTR) sites. Via using average solar irradiance data, we were able to calculate the total amount of energy produced by these hypothetical solar farms as well as the amount of money that would be made off of this electricity. By combining this with the calculated costs of installing these farms as well as the wages of the expected required workforce, we found that if the money is managed properly, this project of converting these MTR sites into solar farms is indeed a feasible business venture with profits in the hundreds of millions or billions of dollars depending on the project scale.
Feasibility of Solar Farm Installation on MTR Sites
Climate change is a major issue that has spread politically and has brought up debates on whether we should move on to more renewable sources of energy such as wind and solar. However, this move has historically been inhibited by the higher costs of these energy sources as well as the issue of finding suitable land to construct these wind and solar farms. In recent years, though, the costs of both of these renewable energy sources, especially solar have decreased significantly, making the construction of large scale solar farms more feasible as time goes on. Furthermore, here in the state of West Virginia, there exist tracts of land where there would be little conflict in constructing these farms: Mountaintop Removal (MTR) sites. Via using average solar irradiance data, we were able to calculate the total amount of energy produced by these hypothetical solar farms as well as the amount of money that would be made off of this electricity. By combining this with the calculated costs of installing these farms as well as the wages of the expected required workforce, we found that if the money is managed properly, this project of converting these MTR sites into solar farms is indeed a feasible business venture with profits in the hundreds of millions or billions of dollars depending on the project scale.
