On Tuesday, June 27, 2017 at 11:50:59 AM UTC-7, Paul Agnew wrote:
Question: Does the previous question add anything to the discussion on solar farms creating thermals? There has to be a forum out there that is better suited for environmental debates. Let's focus on soaring.

I routinely fly high over the Florida Power & Light solar farm near the northeast side of Lake Okeechobee. Occasionally, there are pronounced markers indicating a thermal is cooking off the panels. It's a smaller solar farm, so I'm really eager to see what the mega-solar farm does for us.

Paul A.

I've flown over the (boiler on a stick) solar plants near Primm, NV and haven't found they produce much lift. Haven't seen a cloud over them either.
But have thermaled over the cooling tower of the Pottstown, PA nuclear power plant. First watched a dirigible fly over the towers... The deck angle went to 45 degrees up, leveled out, 45 down, leveled out. And there was a cloud. All good indicators.
But these days the latter type have security people who think "shoot first, ask questions later" (there was an article about it in Soaring) so they aren't as useful for low saves as they used to be.
I live and fly near many Gigawatts of PV panels. Believe one site is a good thermal source, but it wasn't bad before the plant went in.
You'd think PV panels should be like an asphalt parking lot (car park), but the panels are not mounted on the ground. I know the roof of my house is cooler under the panels than the unprotected roof. Wonder if the cooler air underneath panels being brought into the thermal weakens it?
Perhaps they're better lift sources in the evening?
Jim