SPARKLES: SPARKing a nature-positive future of floating solar for humans and nature across LandscapES

Photovoltaic systems (PV) are essential to the energy transition as envisioned by the Climate Agreement. To meet the ambitions of the Dutch Government large scale deployment of PV is needed. This includes placement of floating PV on inland waters, which is of great concern to environmentalists and society at large, as the environmental impact of FPV is not well understood and policy and legislation concerning FPV are not yet in place. SPARKLES solves this problem by addressing the disconnect of the domains of energy science, ecology and governance that currently hampers responsible upscaling of FPV. Capitalizing on its socio-ecological-technological consortium, SPARKLES aims to break down existing siloes to further nature-inclusive FPV development and upscaling through alignment of domains (WP1), working interdisciplinary cross-scale (WP2-4), and increasing societal uptake through co-creation of tools for best practices (WP5) for long term impact. This would be an important societal breakthrough because space is at a premium in the Netherlands, asking for synergies in energy generation and benefits of ecosystems for people and nature. To achieve this breakthrough, we will combine integrative knowledge generation, develop effective transdisciplinary collaboration and design education of the current and next generation of environmental and energy professionals. The overall scientific breakthrough that SPARKLES aims for is the integrative evidence base for the technological, ecological and societal conditions under a nature-positive future of floating solar for humans and nature across landscapes.