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skepticism based on wild conjecture. classic Wild Cobra.
Imo this is a giant step to solve energy problems.
Money well spent.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/13/sc...ml?ref=us&_r=0
skepticism based on wild conjecture. classic Wild Cobra.
No, seriously.
Those mirrors will require periodic cleaning. It could possible be a full time job for dozens of people.
It looks by the design in the pictures, that the mirrors can fold up, for when the sandstorms come. hate to see all them scratched by sand...
It does appear to be a good design, but they will get dirty, and need cleaning.
and?
As if system designers of solar systems in windy, dusty deserts hadn't thought of that problem.
google "automatic solar panel cleaning"
google "effect of dust on solar panel efficiency"
in the short term...
Do you have an idea of the long term costs of continuing to burn coal?
You probably never thought acid rain was a problem and were pissed when coal burning had to have scrubbers.
You need to visit Bejing.
My God.
I never implied they never thought of such things. I just wonder how many people it will employ. I rather doubt they will use an automatic system that uses water, unless it's deionized, that dries so quickly in the desert, when most of the time, they just need dusted off. Dry methods are often the best method.
You need to stop assuming . You are so often wrong when assuming things about me. It really makes you look... well... it really makes you look like a stupid ass.
Controversial Ivanpah Solar Power Plant Sets Record, Settles Controversy
You’re going to be hearing a lot about this one: today, Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz is officially dedicating the Ivanpah Solar Energy Generating System. The massive new facility, now up and running at Ivanpah Dry Lake in California after a series of successful shakedown tests, has set a record as the world’s largest CSP (concentrating solar power) plant of its type.
While the success of the Ivanpah CSP plant gains the US a claim to fame in the hotly compe ive global solar tech market, here at home the massive project has gained notoriety for the whopping $1.6 billion loan guarantee it received from the Department of Energy’s much maligned (at least, by the usual maligners) Loans Programs Office.
We’ve also been keeping a close eye on the 392 MW project because of its A-list array of developers including the company NRG (known for its EV charging stations and freestanding solar canopies), BrightSource Energy, and of course Google, which put up a cool $168 million to help build it, as well as the global engineering firm Bechtel.
About That Ivanpah CSP Controversy…
Back in 2012 Representative Darrell Issa (R- CA), head of the House Oversight Committee, put the Ivanpah CSP plant on the hot seat over a flurry of emails between the company and the Energy Department, as part of an investigation of “preferred treatment” received by six alternative energy projects.
The Committee appeared to be anticipating a Solyndra-style financial collapse by some or all of those projects, including the Ivanpah CSP plant, but rumors of its death were premature, to say the least, and the investigation fizzled out.
For the record, financial risk is a feature, not a bug, of the DOE loan program, which started under the Bush Administration in a push to cement public-private partnerships into the US civic structure. Overall, the program has been a stunning success.
Congress had actually set aside a $10 billion loan loss reserve for the DOE loan program to cover anticipated losses, and as of last year those losses only came up to less than ten percent of that amount.
Ivanpah CSP Plant Powers Up
We’ve been following the Ivanpah project since shovels hit the ground in 2010, with completion expected late in 2013.
Sure enough, in March 2013 the passed its first “flux,” test, in which the plant’s thousands of heliostats (a fancy word for mirror), focused solar energy onto the boiler, bringing it just below the point of steam.
The next step was a shakedown of the plant’s steam pathways, and by September 2013 it was ready for a critical first “sync” test, which it also passed swimmingly (sync refers to synchronizing power output from the plant to the grid).
Earlier this month, various headlines suggested that the plant is now fully operational, but to the best of our knowledge it is still engaged in what is obviously a longer process than simply flipping a switch.
Nevertheless, given the success of the project so far, DOE is on pretty secure footing by going ahead with today’s dedication ceremony.
It’s also a good opportunity for DOE to tout the success of the loan program, which
aside from the world’s largest CSP
also includes one of the world’s largest wind farms,
the first solar thermal storage project and
the first power tower with solar thermal storage in the US, and
some of the world’s largest parabolic trough CSP plants.
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/02/13/...hM3EWdorxyt.99
Make up that will provide your desired outcome and then front like its someone elses burden to prove false.
Who am I describing?
no really, can you prove his (implicit, totally unsubstantiated) point wrong? where's your open mind, Fuzzy?
Speaking of me?
Did I make a wrong point?
Is all this bull about my comment "I wonder what the preventative maintenance schedule is to keep those mirrors clean. How many man-hours/year... ?"
I think you guys are reading too much into a simple question, colored by your own prejudices you pretend not to have.
Ok then, I apologize.
You are in on alternative sources. BTW, lots of maintenance on wind power. The blades build up a lot of static electricity attracting dust. But they look damn good humming away in the middle of the summer (air conditioning soars) around Sinton. Awesome sight for me. And getting less expensive with mass production.
Next generation is going from the 80m height up to 120m+, where wind is both stronger (energy increases with cube of the wind speed) and more consistent, which also allows currently marginal sites to be productive.
btw, while not touching BigCarbon subsidies (doing as Congress is paid to do), Congress has let the Wind Production Tax Credit expire.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybel...endent-market/
The World's Largest Solar Plant Started Creating Electricity Today
LOTS of pics
http://gizmodo.com/the-worlds-larges...ctr-1521998493
looks like a good doc on the misfortunes of wind turbines, with pics of fires, lightening strikes, etc
http://www.windfarmaction.files.word...nd-systems.pdf
Very impressive technology. I wonder if any design or technological breakthroughs lie ahead.
They only use 3 blades because 3 occupy all of the attachment area at the hub.
I wonder if anybody has considered much larger hub diameter to allow more blades, which provides for more energy capture.
I figure somebody will come up with some kind of Gorilla glass/nano-tech for the blade surface so it repels dust, pollution, ice.
Whatever the Wash Tub people put on my car's glass works great for shedding water, and has for many months now.
Last edited by boutons_deux; 02-14-2014 at 01:08 PM.
Good.
There are now enough built for investors to see an actual outcome. If such ventures are not attractive to investors, then they shouldn't be built.
I am fine with alternate methods, but I am against subsidies for them. I firmly believe that investors will naturally move to alternate means of generating power on their own. One problem is that now, they need to have the training wheels off. Because of all the subsidies, tax breaks, etc. they now have the power to tell congress they need help, and the liberal feel good and agenda driven authoritarians are fine with given them our money unnecessarily.
Congress blocks the WPTC, but refuses to cut the annual $Bs of tax expenditures to the most profitable industry of BigCarbon.
Two wrongs don't make a right in my world.
Do they in yours?
The Ivanpah Solar Power Plant Uses Relatively Little Water
“Ivanpah is utilizing dry-cooling technology that dramatically reduces water usage,” Moniz said. “In fact, this entire facility will use roughly the same amount of water as two holes at the nearby golf course.”
http://cleantechnica.com/2014/02/15/...fMF0zVEP38o.99
oops
"Those mirrors have actually been scorching birds that are just out for a nice little afternoon flight around the desert. As you probably guessed, that raised more than a little controversy around the project"
http://www.dvice.com/2014-2-14/large...scorches-birds
Nobody es about the 100Ms of birds killed by domestic and feral cats EVERY YEAR
Another thermal CSP plant
Giant solar battery made of salt ready to charge up
It basically runs on salt but nevertheless Crescent Dunes, the new 110 megawatt solar power and energy storage facility near Tonopah, Nevada, is billed as the “most advanced solar plant in the world” on top of laying claim to being the largest facility of its kind in the world. Now that construction is complete, the commissioning phase is under way so this is a good time to catch up and see what all the excitement is about.
We’re particularly interested in this project because we helped finance it and so did you, if you pay federal income tax. We’re not talking Kickstarter or Indiegogo either. In 2011 we taxpayers backed a $737 million Department of Energy loan to SolarReserve, the project developer.
That puts you and me in the same league as other project investors, the global engineering firm ACS Cobra and the financial services giant Santander, which was named “Sustainable Global Bank of the Year” last year. Not bad, right?
The Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project
In terms of efficiency, Crescent Dunes represents a step up from the demo plants. More than ten thousand ground-mounted mirrors called heliostats collect solar energy and focus it on a central tower, where molten salt is circulated. The heated salt goes down to power a steam turbine, which generates the electricity.
https://plus.google.com/102291313118764969093/posts// ]]>
The molten salt also serves as a “salt battery,” storing energy in the form of heat. When the heliostats are not contributing fresh solar energy, retained heat in the molten salt will continue to produce enough steam to generate electricity for about six hours.
With construction complete, the initial shakedown phase currently under way includes energizing the grid connection and other electrical systems. The heliostats are also undergoing the first stages of calibration for maximum efficiency.
The next steps include a number of stages that are common among conventional power plants, including revving up pathways for water, air, steam, and cooling.
SolarReserve points out, though, that among other differences the dry cooled condenser sported by Crescent Dunes will result in far less water consumption than conventional steam power plants.
The plant is expected to get up to speed later this year and when it does, the utility NV Energy already has dibs on 100 percent of its 500,000 MWh per year, which is enough electricity for 75,000 homes during peak periods.
US Solar Industry Races Ahead While Fossil Fuel Infrastructure Crumbles
Not for nothing, but while we’re on the subject of record-breaking solar power plants supported by us taxpayers, just yesterday the Energy Department held a dedication ceremony for another showpiece for US solar tech leadership, the Ivanpah concentrating solar power plant in California.
Facilities like Crescent Dunes and Ivanpah are not impact free, of course, especially when it comes to the construction supply chain.
However, there is no disputing the fact that once they are up and running, solar facilities do not require the kind of destructive energy harvesting operations required of fossil fuel power plants, and they do not produce the emissions that result from burning fossil fuels.
A recent series of events involving the fossil fuel infrastructure also underscores another indisputable fact, which is that infrastructure crumbles.
There are always going to be infrastructure episodes even under a best case scenario, where ample public and private resources are dedicated to efficient monitoring, troubleshooting, maintainence, and repair.
There is increasing evidence, though, that the US fossil fuel infrastructure has not been attended to, and it’s not getting any younger. Examples from the past few weeks include the Elk River coal washing chemical spill, the Dan River coal ash spill, the Kanawha River coal slurry spill, and a huge gas explosion in a Louisiana-to-New-York gas line that put an entire rural Kentucky county in a state of emergency (fortunately with no lives lost — imagine if that had happened in a more populated area…).
Speaking of gas, hop on over to the Journal of Science and take a look at some research on what’s been leaking out from our aging natural gas infrastructure (h/t: grist.org).
As for oil pipelines, cleanup is still continuing with no end in sight from the 2010 Kalamazoo River oil spill (the largest ever inland oil spill in the US), and last we heard oil is still being found in a 12-acre cove after last year’s Lake Conway oil spill.
And don’t even get us started on fossil fuel disasters related to rail transport.
The point is, when you take infrastructure risks into account, it’s all the more clear that the US cannot sustain a fossil fuel economy for much longer.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/02/1...e+Raw+Story%29
Where the are they going to get all that scarce salt?
I wonder how the mirrors do at surviving a direct hit by a bird as it falls from the sky?
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