Solar–water nexus: on local implications of the procurement and deployment of the first floating solar photovoltaics project in Indonesia

Abstract The possibility of deploying floating solar photovoltaic (FPV) systems on water bodies is increasingly promoted as a promising alternative to contested land acquisitions and land use conflicts associated with conventional solar projects, especially in countries of the Global South. In light of this assertion, the paper unpacks emerging issues at the solar–water nexus and explores territorial manifestations of procurement and deployment practices of the first utility-scale floating solar PV project in rural Indonesia, the 145 MW Cirata floating solar power plant. Empirical research draws on two periods of fieldwork conducted before and after construction of the solar farm, including interviews with developers, citizens, regional and local authorities, and fishing organisations and focus group discussions with local communities. We consider local contestations over the deployment of large-scale renewables as embedded in political–economic dynamics of the energy transition, which co-shape development and procurement practices and give rise to tensions between global development processes and local outcomes for host communities. The paper sheds critical light on how the deployment of the FPV project reconfigures residents’ relationships with the water body through an enclosure of parts of the reservoir, the displacement of water-based livelihoods and struggles for compensation and employment in the involved companies to maintain a living next to the solar farm. We conclude by pointing to tensions impinging on the emerging solar–water nexus in Indonesia and beyond, and juxtaposing our empirical insights with contestations associated with the development of land-based solar projects.