I have previously described a solution to the problem of Global Warming involving Sterling Engines. However, a few years ago I had a different solution, one I never wrote down. I am going to remedy that problem now.

As before, my solution does not directly involve carbon mitigation. It involves heat management and hydrogen production.

As stated before, it is my firm belief that replacing hydrocarbons with pure hydrogen as a fuel is the eventual solution to the problem. The lithium ion solution currently being adopted is all very nice, like a shiny new toy, but at this point in time, ultimately involves the burning of hydrocarbons to produce the electricity that it stores. Additionally, as I previously stated, there isn’t enough lithium on the entire planet to accommodate current demand, never mind allow for growth. Hydrogen is apparently in even shorter supply. However, Hydrogen can be produced fairly easily. One way is by using Sterling engines as I previously mentioned. The other, more obvious way is by using photovoltaics, solar panels. We currently deploy solar panels primarily on land, which despite some problems is pretty effective. But it does nothing to mitigate one of the biggest problems associated with global warming, namely the enormous amount of heat trapped in the oceans. I would like to propose a solution to that problem.

Floating solar panels. Not on a lake as has already been done in some places, but on the ocean surface. 

Now this solution has lots of problems of its own. Storms, waves, ships etc. The challenge here is, how would you keep an effective solar array stable and connected amongst all those problems? Let’s see if we can’t work something out. First, they have to float. Solar panels don’t work very well on the bottom of the ocean. So they need to be surrounded by some sort of foam edging. Something that should be firmly attached. Ok, so now that they float, what happens when a wave flips them over? Well, they stop working that’s what. To fix that we need double sided solar panels. Panels that produce electricity on either side. Next, we need these panels to form an array. That is, we need a bunch of them to be assembled together to produce a significant amount of energy. How do we do that? I would suggest using magnets. Magnets that can be turned on and off. Since the panel is already producing electricity, this shouldn’t be a problem. The magnets could be used short term to position the panels once they are aligned with each other. Then something more permanent could take over, like mechanical hooks. But whatever it is should be able to be reversed quickly if necessary. When would that be? Suppose a ship suddenly plowed through a field of floating solar panels? If they were individual panels, the damage would be significantly less than if they were a large sheet. Ok then if that happened, how would you reassemble them? Well you would have to equip them with small electric motors that allowed them to move around. You would also need to equip them with communication equipment and some sort of processor to enable them to seek out other panels to attach themselves to. All this may sound pretty complicated, but once the field of panels was set up it would stay pretty stable. Also, there has been a lot of work done on getting things to “self assemble”. 

Now once you have all those panels set up, how would you make use of the energy generated? I would suggest that a ship be capable of connecting to the array. The ship would then use that power to power electrolyzers to create Hydrogen. Which could then be transported to wherever you needed it. That would eliminate the need for the hydrogen production to be near the demand. So you could position the arrays wherever the global hot spots are. Imagine acres of these arrays positioned off the coast of Africa. The effect that would have on hurricane intensity would be enormous. 

There is another benefit of these arrays that’s not as obvious; when positioned strategically off the coast of the US, they could be very handy in detecting submarines. Since submarines cause slight disturbances on the ocean surface as they pass underneath in shallow water.

Production of these devices should be fairly inexpensive as they are geared up to scale. Certainly cheaper than current Nuclear Power.

Anyway, that’s my other solution to Global Warming. I’m certain there are others. Maybe you have one?