REPORT: BIG ACTION IN CONCENTRATING SOLAR

Solar power plant capacity is expected to double every 16 months over the next five years and reach 6,400 megawatts by 2012.

Solar power plants typically use one of the several concentrating solar photovoltaic (CSP) technologies although there are some very large photovoltaic (PV) arrays that generate on the power plant (multi-megawatt) scale.

Instead of using PV panels that capture and generate electricity, CSP technologies use reflectors that concentrate the sun to heat fluids which boil water to make steam to drive turbines. The CSP advantage: While electricity generated by PV panels is either used, sent to the grid or lost, steam generated by CSP systems can be stored for a period of hours and used when or where there is (temporarily) no sun.

A study from solar power plant developer Ausra says solar power plant-generated electricity could replace 90% of U.S. fossil fuels, including transportation liquids, at a cost below what the country will spend importing oil.

The land requirement: 15,000 square miles, at locations arrayed throughout the sunbelt. That is less land than the per kilowatt-hour footprint of big hydro (including floodplains) and less than the footprint of coal plants (when coal mining lands are included).

If solar power plant development projected through 2012 continues to 2020, capacity will reach 200,000 megawatts, eliminating the need for approximately 135 coal plants.

That’s hot.

Necessary to facilitate expansion: New transmission.

Partial solution: Build new transmission in existing corridors.

Complete solution: Defeat NIMBY (Not In My BackYard) resistance by cutting those who own the property where wires run in on the revenues. Without new transmission, there are severe limits to how much clean New Energy can be put into use. Without gigawatts and gigawatts of clean New Energy, talk of "mitigating" global climate change will become talk of "adapting" to it. That will not be "happy talk."

Solar power plants are a significant addition to grid peak-demand capacity. Storage capability is expected to improve. Storage is a vital cog in development because, as Professor Nate Lewis of CalTech likes to say, “Those who cannot store do not have power after 4.”

One unique approach to solar power plants combines their capacity to add peak power and their need for storage: They can provide the extra generation required from widespread use of plug-in vehicles, using the vehicles and V2G technology as a means of storage.

From the Earth Policy Institute paper. (click to enlarge)

Solar Thermal Power Coming To A Boil
Jonathan G. Dorn, July 22, 2008 (Earth Policy Institute)

WHO
Earth Policy Institute (Jonathan G. Dorn, researcher/author); Ausra (solar power plant builder); U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)

WHAT
Concentrating solar thermal power (CSP), the technical name for the many varieties of solar power plant technologies, is expected to grow 14 times over its present capacity in the next 4 years.

From the Earth Policy Institute paper. (click to enlarge)

WHEN
- Thru 2006: 15 years of nongrowth for solar power plant technology.
- 2007: 100 megawatts of new solar power plant capacity went on line.
- 2008: Present solar power plant capacity is approximately 430 megawatts.
- 2012: Predicted solar power plant capacity of 6,400 megawatts.
- 2013: Spain will complete a 10-plant, 300-megawatt project.

WHERE
- California’s Mojave Desert: 1985-1991 development of the 354-megawatt Solar Electricity Generating Station (SEGS)
- Nevada Solar One, 64 megawatts, went on line in June 2007
- Spain’s Solucar Platform, a planned 300-megawatt project, brought the 11-megawatt PS10 tower on line in 2007.
- China plans 1,000 megawatts of solar power plant capacity by 2020.
- Other countries developing solar power plant capacity: Australia, Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Israel, Jordan, Mexico, Morocco, South Africa, and the United Arab Emirates.

WHY
- Solar power plant electricity cost in U.S. southwest now, w/ITC, is 13 cents to 17 cents/kW-h, making it competitive w/ne natural gas plant construction. DOE expects cost to be 7 cents to 10 cents/kW-h in 2015 and 5 cents to 7 cents/kW-h in 2020,making it competitive w/any fossil fuel, especially when there is a price on emissions.
- New incentives for solar power plant development are part of the increased activity:
(1) The U.S. investment tax credit (ITC) applies. More importantly, Renewable Electricity Standards (RESs), now in 26 states, drive development.
(2) Israel’s solar power plant feed-in tariff: 19.4 cents/kW-h.
(3) Various incentives in France, Greece, Italy, and Portugal will facilitate at least 3,200 megawatts of solar power plants capacity by 2020.
- Planned for the U.S.: 3,100 megawatts, including the 553-megawatt Mojave Solar Park in California, the 500-megawatt Solar One and 300-megawatt Solar Two projects in California, a 300-megawatt facility in Florida, and the 280-megawatt Solana plant in Arizona.
- Planned for Spain: 2,570 megawatts including 60 plants
- Planned for Israel: 250 megawatts in the Negev, expected to feed power for Project Better Place, a breakthrough electric car program due in 2010.

From the Earth Policy Institute paper. (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
From the report: “CSP plants on less than 0.3 percent of the desert areas of North Africa and the Middle East could generate enough electricity to meet the needs of these two regions plus the European Union. Realizing this, the Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation—an initiative of The Club of Rome, the Hamburg Climate Protection Foundation, and the National Energy Research Center of Jordan—conceived the DESERTEC Concept in 2003. This plan to develop a renewable energy network to transmit power to Europe from the Middle East and North Africa calls for 100,000 megawatts of CSP to be built throughout the Middle East and North Africa by 2050. Electricity delivery to Europe would occur via direct current transmission cables across the Mediterranean. Taking the lead in making the concept a reality, Algeria plans to build a 3,000-kilometer cable between the Algerian town of Adrar and the German city of Aachen to export 6,000 megawatts of solar thermal power by 2020.”