In Europe, Wind and Solar Overtake Fossil Fuels

Re:In Europe, Wind and Solar Overtake Fossil Fuels by eitally on Thursday January 22, 2026 @12:03PM (#46721922)

I live in a fairly arid place (Bay Area) where it rains in winter but gets quite dry and dusty in the summer. I've had rooftop solar since 2016 and have noticed that generation decreases by as much as 8-10% when the panels are covered in summer dust.

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Re:In Europe, Wind and Solar Overtake Fossil Fuels by nehal3m on Thursday January 22, 2026 @12:13PM (#46722064)

I wonder if it's worth setting up a sort of sprinkler system so you can easily clean it by opening a valve. Maybe add a pipe with some holes in it to the top of the panel, and some flexible hose to hook it up to the next one.

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Re:In Europe, Wind and Solar Overtake Fossil Fuels by zejn on Friday January 23, 2026 @05:32AM (#46730824)

Just spraying dust with water will not remove it. Detergent helps, but most of the cleaning effect is done by mechanical agitation, eg. wiping the glass.

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Re:In Europe, Wind and Solar Overtake Fossil Fuels by darkwater on Friday January 23, 2026 @10:42AM (#46733823)

Here it's not so dusty, but in spring there can be a ton of flying pollen and yet, our not so abundant rains (generally speaking, there are more and more stormy episodes lately once a year) are enough to clean it up.

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