The solar power you don't hear about

Solar thermal power deserves more attention, due to its lower cost and relative ease of storage 35

Solar thermal power is back! Solar thermal gets less attention than its sexier cousin -- high-tech photovoltaics -- but has two big advantages. First, it is much cheaper than PV. Second, it captures energy in a form that is much easier to store -- heat -- typically with mirrored surfaces that concentrate sunlight onto a receiver that heats a liquid (which is then used to make steam to drive a turbine).

csp2.jpg

Back in the 1980s, Luz International was the sole commercial developer of U.S. solar thermal electric projects. The company built nine solar plants, totaling 355 MW of capacity, in California's Mojave desert. Luz filed for bankruptcy in 1991 for a variety of reasons detailed in this Sandia report.

For 15 years, no commercial solar thermal plants had been built until the creation of the Spanish system pictured here. Technology Review has published, as an advertising supplement, one of the longest and most informative pieces I have seen on solar thermal, also called concentrated solar power (CSP).

csp1.jpg

California utilities are also beginning to contract for new CSP plants -- "the resurrection of thermal solar arrays," as the New York Times puts it. In July, Pacific Gas & Electric announced a plan to buy 550 megawatts of CSP in the Mojave Desert.

If you want to read more about this re-emerging form of solar power, the National Renewable Energy Lab has a website with publications on the technology and potential market.

This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Joseph Romm is the editor of Climate Progress and a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.

Related Stories

Advertisement
Advertisement

  1. Aklemm Posted 7:08 am
    30 Aug 2007

    Solar-Thermal ProjectsThe issue with Solar Thermal projects is the land area required and the subsequent need for transmission and distribution of the power.
    Solar Thermal is significantly more difficult to do as a distributed combined heat & power application for a couple of reasons.
    Land area required

    Super-heated steam requires a union pipe fitter to be onsiste & monitor the system while it is pressurized.

    Transmission & Distribution/interconnection issues.
    Otherwise a great technology that should make a comeback in the sunbelt.

    Permalink

  2. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 7:11 am
    30 Aug 2007

    1970s era technologyConcentrator pv supplants thermal engines in both economics and efficiency.  I just sent out this missive an hour ago and include here for your update... links are hot photos.
    Solar Team --
    One hour ago I installed and tested the Lytron 25 pv heat sink.  We have zero funds so there is little reliable data.  However, I am assuming 40 W/cm2 on Silicon VMJ cells (Bernard Sater, PhotoVolt).  The voltage drop was zero so we had excellent thermal management despite non-conductive adhesive layers.  I am surprised.  Kudos to Bernie!
    The assembly will remain in the glass dish this winter for weather and flux durability testing.
    -- Doug
    http://www.harbornet.com/sunflower/Lytron25.jpg

    http://www.harbornet.com/sunflower/dish1.jpg

    Permalink

  3. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 7:17 am
    30 Aug 2007

    Steam and mirrorsLand cost is 5% to 10% of system cost.  I have been cogenerating heat and power all morning.
    Solar mirrors are good in most climates, including Seattle.

    Permalink

  4. odograph Posted 8:40 am
    30 Aug 2007

    socalThose of us in SoCal sprawl still have miles of desert over the hill from us ... much of it between there and the SCE coal plants across the river in Nevada.

    Permalink

  5. wayneluke Posted 9:40 am
    30 Aug 2007

    Over the hillI live over the hill from you. The metropolitan sprawl has hit us as well. The local water districts are wondering if there will be enough water to put through the taps come December.  They only got 60% of the water allocation requested this year. It might drop to 28% next year. Yet, the cities keep issuing permits to build new houses.
    On the local energy front, SCE is fighting a war trying to get 3000 MW of wind power transmission lines built. They have 3 of several segments approved but the fourth is getting too close to people's property so they are putting up a fight. Its needed to tie in the Antelope Valley local grid though. As it is, I think we have a Luz facility sitting in the desert about halfway to Las Vegas which doesn't have transmission lines to this day.
    Also on SCE's website it says they shut down their coal plant in Nevada.

    http://www.sce.com/PowerandEnvironment/PowerGeneration/Mo ...

    Of course they are still buying much needed electricity from somewhere and it is probably coal. I wouldn't mind a few more concentrated solar plants.  It is the tranmission lines that will kill deals though. That and the fact that the desert is a fragile environment as well. Most of the Mojave is under one protective order or another.

    Permalink

  6. IfOnly Posted 11:34 am
    30 Aug 2007

    More infoGreat post.  Solar thermal is a great and cheap alternative.  Read more about solar thermal here.

    Permalink

  7. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 11:57 am
    30 Aug 2007

    Sterling engines look very interesting......according to the EnergyBlog:Experimental models of the Stirling dish technology have undergone more than 26,000 hours of successful solar operation. The cost for each prototype unit is about $150,000. Once in production SES estimates that the cost could be reduced to less than $50,000 each, ($2.00 per watt) which would make the cost of electricity competitive with conventional fuel technologies.

    Permalink

  8. tedyost1970 Posted 1:48 pm
    30 Aug 2007

    Totally missing the pointI thought (by the headline and teaser) that this article had promise when it started out by saying how solar thermal has often been overlooked and overshadowed by its sexier cousin: Solar PV.
    Wow... great point and great start, but the article simply is a description of another glitzy incarnation of solar power: the large scale plant.
    Not one word about solar heating for individual buildings: domestic hot water or space heating.
    Not one word how cutting individual building/dwelling demands by 20, 40, 60% or whatever makes a huge difference in fossil fuel consumption and resulting economic drain and pollution.
    What's wrong? Not everything is solved in some far -off facility with magic power.
    The real magic is the power of the individual. The responsibility of the individual to save 5% here, 10% there.
    Once we get over the addiction of the quick, somebody-else-can-do-it fix, we have a chance for recovery.
    I wish there were a statistic that could estimate how much it would cost to install one 4' x 8' solar hot water collector per family in the United States.
    I wish I knew how much fossil fuel that action would save
    I wish I knew how much CO2 that action would save.
    I wish I knew how many days of war in Iraq that entire program would cost.
    In the meantime, I am installing a couple at my house before autumn.
    Let's hear more about this, please.

    Permalink

  9. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 2:23 pm
    30 Aug 2007

    Some stats......are in this article I wrote about electricity use, but do you know how much a 4X8 solar water heater costs and how much heat it produces and how much water it heats up?

    Permalink

  10. keldred Posted 1:54 am
    31 Aug 2007

    Don't forget solar cookingI just got into solar ovens this summer and found that building one not only used up a bunch of scraps in my basement but also was a lot of fun.  
    Then I brought my oven to work and a couple of my coworkers got excited about it too.  Now every sunny day is a solar cookoff.  Here is a link that offers a bunch of really good designs http://www.solarcooking.org/plans/
    Not only do we not use the microwave much anymore, but the food tastes much better.  Unfortunately the good solar cooking season in western Washington is about over, though now I have one more thing to look forward too next summer.

    Permalink

  11. odograph Posted 2:53 am
    31 Aug 2007

    sterlingI've been wondering about those Stirling designs, according to this old quote we should be hearing now how the test system went:
    A test site will be built by SoCal Edision which should be complete in the spring of 2007, and produce 1 megawatt of power with 40 units.  SoCal Edison will start construction on their 500 megawatt farm in mid-2008 and finish construction by the end of 2012.  Each dish can produce 25-35 kilowatts, and the site will utilize 20,000 dishes over 4,500 acres and power 300,000 homes and have options to expand to 34,000 dishes with a capacity of 1,350 megawatts.

    Permalink

  12. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 4:35 am
    31 Aug 2007

    Polish the StirlingStirling is not moving forward, has a generic problem - no lubrication.  This causes engine wear.  If it was lubricated and was a VW engine running at 50 mph it would crap out at 300,000 miles, 6,000 hours, 3 solar years, can not amortize.  Engine-generator cost would exceed $1/Watt, more like $2/Watt installed with concentrator.
    Wrong question.  If you could make natural gas from sunlight at 80% efficiency then use that gas to make power 24/7 at 50% efficiency -- why would you use solar thermal power only when the sun shines?

    Permalink

  13. trock Posted 5:55 am
    31 Aug 2007

    this is just one articleThis is just one article, there are certainly other important ways to make solar energy usable, it just takes time to go thru them all.
    Not everybody would be interested to have a solar anything on there house.   That might be 80 to 90 percent of the population.   (unless there was enough incentive)    That's why we need to get to utility scale CSP, so people who only want electricity and don't care it's source, would also get it from carbon reduced sources.
    This one from spain, with a center tower and acres of mirrors, is the one that I have read has the lowest cost potential.  I think it's the one that should be emphasized.
    It's good to see more of CSP' getting put in.   If only it could go at a faster pace.
    The dish CSP's are to expensive, I don't see how they can make it.

    Permalink

  14. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 7:03 am
    31 Aug 2007

    sunflower, Any links on this?I think they said it sterling was $2/watt. SCE is putting a lot in, I would think they don't have that big of a problem.  What are you referring to with 80% solar efficiencyleading to gas?  sorry I don't know the reference.

    Permalink

  15. jaall Posted 7:46 am
    31 Aug 2007

    Solar thermal>I have been cogenerating heat and power all morning.
    Via Solar? Please tell more. I'm a newbie here, so please copy me at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

    //
    var l=new Array();

    var output = '';

    l[0]='>';l[1]='a';l[2]='/';l[3]='';l[25]='\"';l[26]=' 109';l[27]=' 111';l[28]=' 99';l[29]=' 46';l[30]=' 108';l[31]=' 105';l[32]=' 97';l[33]=' 109';l[34]=' 103';l[35]=' 64';l[36]=' 110';l[37]=' 101';l[38]=' 108';l[39]=' 108';l[40]=' 97';l[41]=' 97';l[42]=' 110';l[43]=' 104';l[44]=' 111';l[45]=' 106';l[46]=':';l[47]='o';l[48]='t';l[49]='l';l[50]='i';l[51]='a';l[52]='m';l[53]='\"';l[54]='=';l[55]='f';l[56]='e';l[57]='r';l[58]='h';l[59]='a ';l[60]='

    Permalink

  16. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 8:15 am
    31 Aug 2007

    I am agnostic on power convertersI looked hard at all of the small heat engine types for 20 years and just gave up.  None of them pencil out due to moving parts wear, thermal cycling, exotic high temperature materials, and so on.  The main problem is that lubricants can not take the heat.  In cooler steam engines the lubricating oil is added to the steam and must be separated back out from the steam discharge.  
    The recent history of Stirling engines comes from the 1970s plan in Sweden to use United Sterling engines in cars during the OPEC oil embargo.  Solar power engineers tried to use these engines because they were to be mass produced in Sweden.  The engines failed cost and durability tests and were abandoned for cars, and subsequently shelved for solar applications.  Stirling companies were spun off at 5% of former value yet remained promoted by the salvage buyers, now Stirling Energy Systems.  That quote on the lifetime of VW engines applied to heat engine lifetime projections came from one of the many CSP conferences we all attended year after year.
    Solar power is sexy but not scalable, like what Vinod Khosla said about pv.  Lovins on displacing natural gas before making power with solar concentrators said, "You have to learn to fly before making plans to land on Mars".  The costs, risks, complexity, and ROI is excellent for solar industrial process heat (a solar program terminated by Reagan, solar concentrators were terminated by Bush).  Those solar programs would have saved natural gas using 80% efficient solar concentrator systems.   Displacing gas with solar is the same as making gas with solar.
    What I can not prove but definitely suspect is that simple low-cost solar energy became complicated high-cost solar power as a method to set up solar to fail.  It is damning disinformation concerning the efficacy of solar energy to displace fossil fuels.

    Permalink

  17. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 8:21 am
    31 Aug 2007

    john a allen --cogenerating heat and power
    http://www.harbornet.com/sunflower/litxs.jpg

    Permalink

  18. Solshapiro Posted 9:13 am
    31 Aug 2007

    Right OnCSP - solar thermal electric generation should be the 800 pound gorilla of our renewables base.  On less than 10,000 square miles of the southwest, we can make all the electrical energy used in the U.S. and send it around the country on high voltage dc.  This is not to denigrated local use of cost effective technologies such as wind and geothermal.  But solar thermal electric generation now seems to be moving down to a cost in the order of 10 cents a kwh and will continue down as it is built out.

    Sol Shapiro ((JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

    //
    var l=new Array();

    var output = '';

    l[0]='>';l[1]='a';l[2]='/';l[3]='';l[19]='\"';l[20]=' 109';l[21]=' 111';l[22]=' 99';l[23]=' 46';l[24]=' 110';l[25]=' 115';l[26]=' 109';l[27]=' 64';l[28]=' 108';l[29]=' 114';l[30]=' 97';l[31]=' 109';l[32]=' 111';l[33]=' 83';l[34]=':';l[35]='o';l[36]='t';l[37]='l';l[38]='i';l[39]='a';l[40]='m';l[41]='\"';l[42]='=';l[43]='f';l[44]='e';l[45]='r';l[46]='h';l[47]='a ';l[48]='

    Permalink

  19. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 10:06 am
    31 Aug 2007

    Sunflower, just to be clear......the small (25kw) sterling engines would not work (say on the roof of a big building or ex-parking lot), but might work in a big configuration that SCE is using?  I seem to remember that you once said that small csp's could be built, but perhaps I misunderstood - and the lubrication is needed in order to move the engine to track the sun, but it gets too hot to work properly?  Thanks!

    Permalink

  20. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 1:05 pm
    31 Aug 2007

    Scale upI don't know if anybody knows lifetime.  Every year I hear big stories that never happen.  Its an old story.
    My lede are heliostats reflecting sunlight to towers for process heat applications.   Heliostats are very simple mirrors on poles.  The industrial gas saved can then be used for baseload gas turbines, which are scalable off-the-shelf power.
    High-intensity pv power can be generated off the tops of the thermal cycles on solar towers.   Solar Systems in Oz has drawings of pv towers.
    Cooling solar power plants in deserts is a waste of thermal energy, and difficult.   Distributed solar cogeneration systems near people are more efficient, lower cost with greater value - heat and power.

    Permalink

  21. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 3:09 pm
    31 Aug 2007

    OK, so heliostats......that are miniature scale of the Spanish installation, they can be scaled down to, say, the roof of a large building or a parking lot?

    Permalink

  22. GreyFlcn Posted 3:24 pm
    31 Aug 2007

    As for a solar you don't often hear aboutAs for a solar you don't often hear about,

    How about "Organic thinfilm solar"

    http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/07/070719011151 ...

    http://www.blog.thesietch.org/2007/04/08/organic-solar-ce ...
    For all those who are big boosters of biofuels, even the weak efficiency ratings (5.2%ish) of these organic panels, trumps the efficiency of biofuels, even before processing it from solid biomass into a liquid fuel.

    http://greyfalcon.net/sugarsolar
    _
    This is for those who are so concerned that we will run out of raw materials for solar panels.

    Permalink

  23. guerby Posted 6:42 pm
    31 Aug 2007

    GreyFlcnGreyFlcn, you post great stuff here thanks!
    Do you have a website with a list of your graphs & documents URLs?
    Thanks in advance,
    Laurent

    Permalink

  24. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 12:26 am
    01 Sep 2007

    Mini heliostatsYes, I've seen them as small as ping pong balls.  The current sweet spot is about 12 feet square.  Heliostats over parking lots reflecting to towers over factories is a good image.  They can also feed into district heating/cooling and power plants to reduce fuel consumption.

    Permalink

  25. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 12:49 am
    01 Sep 2007

    Ideas R UsIdea Labs - Bill Gross - has one foot heliostats on building roofs.

    Permalink

  26. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 3:55 am
    01 Sep 2007

    sunflower, thanks

    Permalink

  27. Delay And Deny's avatar

    Delay And Deny Posted 4:12 am
    01 Sep 2007

    Eco-Foundries

    Good article in WP today about old style "iron works" being used for enviro projects like tidal wave transformers:
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007 ...
    "PORTLAND, Ore. -- Oregon Iron Works has the feel of a World War II-era shipyard, with sparks flying from welders' torches and massive hydraulic presses flattening large sheets of metal. But this factory floor represents the cutting edge of American renewable-energy technology."

    John Bailo


    Sutext:

    Permalink

  28. Jon Rynn's avatar

    Jon Rynn Posted 7:12 am
    01 Sep 2007

    Bailo, thanks, and idea labs link......company called esolar, they claim that covering 1% of the Sahara desert with their systems would provide enough electricity for the whole planet.

    Permalink

  29. sunflower's avatar

    sunflower Posted 8:05 am
    01 Sep 2007

    esolar drawings news sans news, thanks JonCritical cost information needed --
    Heliostat installed cost below $200/m2 will blow the pants off coal. Same below $100/m2 in cloudy Seattle type climates.  It can be done.

    Permalink

  30. concerned1984 Posted 12:50 am
    13 Apr 2008

    nanosolarI've been a proponent of solar power for 30 years now, but until some one like bush finds a way to keep on getting paid for it(sun power that is)but at least it will be clean & inexaustable! but let's face it,our president & his co-horts are too vested in oil, & have proven that by trading our kids lives for their interest in Iraq? 1st it was weapons of mass destruction(none found),then it was terrorists(got plenty of other countries breeding them)? now it is(a stable Iraq)? the man is a lair & lining his pockets with blood money!Texas needs to build over 150 new coal burning plants, Florida wants nuclear plants? not enough desert in Texas? FED EX runs a shipping plant on solar, with some to spare?& there is plenty of cleared, unused land here in north Florida? almost every roof here could be redone with these new pv shingles, & put lots of people to work? but then the electric companies couldn't justify their price hikes & fuel fees! invest in America for Americans, or soon we will all be homeless!God bless&best wishes in these troubled times.

    Permalink

  31. concerned1984 Posted 1:34 am
    13 Apr 2008

    cooling in the desertwhy cool at all, just use the heat to run steam turbines & make more power? solar hot water systems have been in use since the 70s, i had one on my roof!stop trying to make excuses why solar can't be used, unless you like choking on the air you'll be breathing, in 10 or so years? or maybe you own oil futures? & now pv shingles are available, there is no reason every home should have them!

    Permalink

  32. concerned1984 Posted 1:38 am
    13 Apr 2008

    rooftop solartell that to FED-EX???

    Permalink

  33. concerned1984 Posted 1:42 am
    13 Apr 2008

    the truth the "OIL MAGGITS"they would rather destroy our bio-sphere instead!

    Permalink

  34. fireofenergy Posted 10:33 am
    17 Oct 2008

    TransmissionI heard that such lines cost 1.5 million per mile. If say, 50 sq mi of land was to be used for CST (concentrated solar thermal) plants, and assuming that each 7 sq mi = 1 gigawatt (probably less but with much higher capacity with molten salt storage), and assuming that it cost $4 per watt, then $28 billion for a small percentage of America's needs but at least 28 times than cost of the lines! If everybody paid a dollar a month for lines, then over 100 miles worth every month!

    Permalink

  35. Delay And Deny's avatar

    Delay And Deny Posted 11:18 am
    17 Oct 2008

    Volcano!

    Who said Palin wasn't an innovator?
    http://volcanism.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/geothermal-powe ...
    Reuters reports that the State of Alaska is preparing a geothermal leasing programme for Mount Spurr which would allow energy companies to exploit the volcano's heat sources as a means of generating energy, and that a similar programme is being considered for another Alaskan volcano, Augustine. The Eruptions blog has more.


    http://eruptions.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/geothermal-powe ...
    If Alaska wants to take a cue from Iceland, it might find itself with more power than it can use. That is, if the dreams of the Alaska Division of Oil and Gas come true. They are planning to lease land on Mt. Spurr and possibly Mt. Augustine for geothermal exploration.

    Permalink

Add a Comment

You are not logged in. Thus, you cannot post a comment. If you have an account, log in. If you don't have an account, well, by all means go make one! Meet you back here in five.

Hello, Visitor!    Why not register?

Viewed
More
Commented
More
Advertisement