Green Roofs are a Chance to Study the Virtuous Circle Between Plants and Solar Panels
Sourced from KUER90
Jennifer Bousselot is a gardener, but her crops aren’t on the ground – they’re on the roof of one of the Colorado State University buildings in downtown Denver.
On the top of the roof are rows of native plants, colorful flowers and ripe vegetables. It’s not exactly a quiet garden scene as cars zoom past the building on Interstate 25. But Bousselot has a vision for it.
“I wanted to use plants in order to provide more ideal conditions for livability in cities,” she said. “So these are about providing additional benefits in places that are often unused.”
Bousselot, an assistant horticulture professor, is conducting research on rooftop agrivoltaics — how plants grow under solar panels. Her fascination started 15 years ago, but it was unintentional.
“I was very frustrated to see that another scientist had put up a solar array at the edge of my research plots,” Bousselot said. “But over the next two or three growing seasons, I saw an incredible response of the plants around that space.”
It’s due to their synergy, she said. Solar panels tend to get too hot on conventional rooftops, which can reach 150 degrees or higher, and that heat reduces their efficiency. Plants help cool them off.
“If you have plants under there, they evaporatively cool their surrounding areas so they can survive,” Bousselot said. “So typically plants under a solar panel get the conditions very close to what ambient conditions are and therefore the panels end up benefiting.”
From the Living Architecture Monitor
