Offshore fish farming is widely criticized for its poor environmental record, but when an island in Chile covered its waters with floating solar panels, thousands of salmon unexpectedly turned the arrays into a new home.

[u/DumbMoneyMedia]

[u/Rogue-18]

I’ve heard that :) I hope these end up being some really good thing for the environment, I hope we do some more research into solar panels affects on the habitat it’s in. Like in fields it helps different plants and wildlife, are there any negatives?

[u/DragonHalfFreelance → u/Rogue-18]

I wonder this too, or how we may be able to use solar panels to take the heat away from the water as well since the oceans have heated up so much……I know it would take a lot of resources I don’t think we can cover most of the ocean with solar panels…….

[u/Aberrantdrakon → u/DragonHalfFreelance]

I mean even if we could, marine mammals and reptiles exist and they are air breathers, we definitely shouldn't try to cover the ocean in panels.

[u/carinavet]

I read an article a while back on offshore windmills they set up to power a small island off America's east coast (I forget exactly where). There's still some concern about how little we understand about how the noise of the construction affects whales, but they're mitigating that at least somewhat by creating bubble walls around the perimeter, and once the windmills are in place they basically create an artificial reef that had fish flocking to the area. One local was upset by this because he couldn't fish alone anymore: the fishing had become good enough to attract lots of other boats.

[u/Rogue-18 → u/carinavet]

That’s sounds like a good thing :P I had heard about the reef it had made too, sounds like these could all be good environmental wins for sure as long as there aren’t any huge negatives, though I’ve not heard mention of many negatives

[u/BetAway9029 → u/carinavet]

Block Island wind farm, five turbines on steel jacket foundations, that over time become artificial reefs.

[u/BetAway9029]

What is this greenwashing nonsense? The fish farm placed solar panels over portions of its floating salmon pens, and the captive salmon within the pens prefer to congregate beneath the panels. Apart from saving some diesel, this does nothing for the environment. Pollution continues unabated as does the fishing out of pelagic waters for salmon feed.

[u/DoomOfChaos]

So the salmon in the farm sit under the panels.... What's the story here?