Aquavoltaic System for Harvesting Salt and Electricity at the Salt Farm Floor: Concept and Field Test

This article describes concepts and designs of a photovoltaic system for harvesting salt and electricity at salt farm floor, with attention given to waterproofing, salt resistance, material and electrical safety, maintenance, and economic feasibility. The authors found that the power generation of the salt-farm parallel system is comparable to that of conventional solar power plants and that the cooling effect by seawater contributes more to the increase in the crystalline silicon photovoltaic module performance than does the absorption loss due to seawater by maintaining a certain height above the module.