Solar panels fool breeding insects

Solar panel polarized light pollution misleads aquatic insects like mayflies, creating ecological traps that disrupt reproduction, Michigan State University research finds. Polarized reflections mimic water; white grid overlays can mitigate impacts with minimal energy loss.

The cells that make up solar panels can draw insects from their breeding sites, fooling them into believing they're laying their eggs in a safe place, a new study finds.

Instead, the eggs fail to hatch, jeopardizing the reproduction of a variety of insects.

Research from the Michigan State University finds that the shiny black solar cells that use the sun's rays to generate electricity are also highly attractive to aquatic insects as they reflect sunlight, creating polarized light. Because polarized light is the way insects identify the surface of water, many, such as mayflies, mistakenly believe the panels are water and deposit eggs on the surface of the panels, even as innovations in solar energy continue apace.

"This research demonstrates that solar panels are a strong new source of polarized light pollution that creates ecological traps for many types of insect," said Bruce Robertson, a research associate at Michigan State University's Kellogg Biological Station, in a release.

"This is of significant conservation importance given the radical expansion in solar energy development, including light-trapping designs that increase absorption, and the strong negative impacts of ecological traps on animal populations."

The study finds that the addition of white grids to the surface of the panels - or other methods, such as layered coatings that alter surface reflection, of breaking up the polarized reflection of light - could reduce this problem. However, the white strips could potentially reduce energy generation by about 1.8 per cent.

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