What is the best place to construct solar power stations? Obviously, you need a lot of sunlight, few clouds and little rainfall. So the best place for this purpose is – you guessed correctly – deserts.
Deploying solar panels in deserts has many advantages. So it is no wonder that the ten largest solar power plants are located in the hottest and the driest regions of the world.
Renewable Energy Development in the California Desert. Photo by Tom Brewster Photography / Bureau of Land Management California, Public Domain via Flickr
So perhaps we should simply turn deserts into huge solar energy farms? On such scale, the power gains could be massive. And, since these are completely arid lands, there are no disadvantages of doing so. One study has even proposed the possibility of converting the climate of Sahara Desert into something much more favorable for humans to live in, just by covering a part of its territory in solar panels.
Is there anything that could go wrong? The following video provides a nice explanation of the effects that could be caused through building an extremely large solar farm in Sahara:
