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I don't see the goals overlapping other than the fact that they both float. The solar panels will cost 1000x that of rubber balls, and the cost of repair/maintenance of floating panels will be much higher than land mounted panels. There may be some circumstances where you can kill two birds but I bet it's rare.

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As the sibling points out, canals seem like a good place to shade water with solar, though probably not floating.

Floating is overwhelmingly better, because cold panels are more efficient than dry ones.

^ small nit - cold panels are more efficient than hot ones, not dry ones!

Dry panels get hotter than wet ones can.

Canals are tough because the maintenance of the canal is much harder, and the flow of the canal also makes things tricky. Dr. Brandi McKuin has done some work here, looks like the best way to do this is to hang the panels suspended on cables over the canals, but that requires a lot of steel and is thus fairly expensive. I don't think we've cracked that nut yet...

Balls generate zero revenue. Solar arrays generate net revenue.

this is correct ^, it is net positive for healdsburg, for instance

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