Place them panels below power lines!

Instead of building new infrastructure or searching for land, how about using existing ones? That is what energy experts are thinking out in the US.

Transmission right-of-way, providing 20% of U.S. electricity from solar, is just one piece of the puzzle, with another 20% possible using existing rooftops and a solar potential of nearly 100% from solar on highway right-of-way.

What if the U.S. could get 20 percent of its power from solar, near transmission lines, and without covering virgin desert? It could.

Transmission right-of-way corridors, vast swaths of vegetation-free landscape to protect high-voltage power lines, could provide enough space for over 600,000 megawatts of solar PV. These arrays could provide enough electricity to meet 20% of the country’s electric needs.

There are 155,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in the United States(defined as lines 230 kilovolts and higher). According to at least two major utilities (Duke Energy and the Tennessee Valley Authority), such power lines require a minimum of 150 feet of right-of-way, land generally cleared of all significant vegetation that might come in contact with the power lines.

That’s 4,400 square miles of already developed (or denuded) land for solar power, right under existing grid infrastructure. But given that the lines would amke for some shading, and assuming that half of transmission line right-of-way is unsuitable for solar, even then it leaves 2,200 square miles of available land for solar.

With approximately 275 megawatts (MW) installed per square mile, over 600,000 MW of solar could occupy the available right-of-way, providing enough electricity (over 720billion kilowatt-hours) to supply 20 percent of U.S. power demands. Howzatt??

Now that should apply for many places the world over. Pronto, you have the place you have been searching for to set up panels, right?