The World's Largest Solar Plant

[nhboy]

Link to original source.

"Take 300,000 computer-controlled mirrors, each 7 feet high and 10 feet wide. Control them with computers to focus the Sun's light to the top of 459-foot towers, where water is turned into steam to power turbines. Bingo: you have the world's biggest solar power plant, the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System.

Long-mired by regulatory issues and legal tangles, the enormous solar plant–jointly owned by NRG Energy, BrightSource Energy and Google–opened for business today.

From the official news release:

The Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System is now operational and delivering solar electricity to California customers. At full capacity, the facility's trio of 450-foot high towers produces a gross total of 392 megawatts (MW) of solar power, enough electricity to provide 140,000 California homes with clean energy and avoid 400,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, equal to removing 72,000 vehicles off the road.

Sprawling across a staggering 5 square miles of federal land near the California-Nevada border, it looks goddamn beautiful. Just look at these amazing images.: "

 

[glhs837]

And that amount of money and time spent building a nuke plant? What would that power? (minus all the stupid regulation meant to kill that industry, not unlike all the appeals for DP cases see a correlation here? )

 

[dontknowwhy]

In 6 mos., please post the article about how it actually only powers 6 energy saving lightbulbs & nothing else at 1 time

 

[Larry Gude]

393 MW, 140,000 homes, 5 sq miles.

So, 14 million or so housing 'units' in Cali means we need about 100 of these or, 500 sq miles of glass. At $2.5 billion per, that's $250,000,000,000

For power. Less than half the day. For 35 million folks.

For $6 billion, Palo Verde (largest nuke plant in the US) serves 4 million folks so, ten times that, $60 billion, we can have power, 24 hours a day,

For 1/40 the cost.



Edited for accuracy; Thanks Tilted!

 

[Larry Gude]

Furthermore, that's $18,000 per household for construction for part time electricity.

 

[glhs837]

Furthermore, that's $18,000 per household for construction for part time electricity.

But damn, dont it feel good

"Your voltage for nothing, and your chicks for free"

 

[Larry Gude]

But damn, dont it feel good

"Your voltage for nothing, and your chicks for free"

It's the perfect combination of privatizing gain and socializing loss while not serving the national interest or promoting the general welfare. Even a little bit.

 

[Gilligan]

Like the solar abomination in Hughesville...20-plus prime acres wasted to produce, intermittently, what could be produced reliably using one tractor-trailer-sized power generation unit running on natural gas.

 

[Larry Gude]

Like the solar abomination in Hughesville...20-plus prime acres wasted to produce, intermittently, what couple be produced reliably using one tractor-trailer-sized power generation unit running on natural gas.

How are pebble bed reactors working out? They sounded pretty good a decade ago.

The idea of municipalities and industry having their own local systems using non weapons grade energy, cheap, low maintenance, like all of that.

 

[SamSpade]

Like the solar abomination in Hughesville...20-plus prime acres wasted to produce, intermittently, what could be produced reliably using one tractor-trailer-sized power generation unit running on natural gas.

That thing in Hughesville is SMECO saying, "sorry, the law says we have to have one, so here it is".

 

[aps45819]

And that amount of money and time spent building a nuke plant?
What would that power?

a light bulb at night

 

[glhs837]

How are pebble bed reactors working out? They sounded pretty good a decade ago.

The idea of municipalities and industry having their own local systems using non weapons grade energy, cheap, low maintenance, like all of that.

IT"S FREAKING NUCLEAR!!!!!!! Thats how they are working out, why use logic when you can work so much more efficiently using hysteria.

That thing in Hughesville is SMECO saying, "sorry, the law says we have to have one, so here it is".

Ah, so it's strippers pasty of energy generation......... got it.

 

[Tilted]

I suppose this is as good a place as any for the following.

I've been thinking about this, trying to figure out if I - as a shareholder - like it. I'm pretty sure now that I do and, further, I think this move by Apple will represent the beginning of a trend. Going forward I can see other large companies with large energy needs signing long term deals to buy energy at a predetermined rate, and in so doing (effectively) guaranteeing the return on the capital investments that are needed to make projects of this scale possible. From Apple's perspective, and from the perspective of other companies that might enter into similar deals, they're basically just hedging future energy costs.

My back of the envelope calculations (which I'll share if anyone cares) suggest to me that this deal makes a lot of sense financially for Apple. It seems to me that Apple is again doing what it's so often done - taking advantage of technology when, and only when, that technology reaches the point that it makes sense, the point where it can be put to effective use rather than just used because it might seem cool. We are apparently at (or pretty near) that point with large scale solar farms (at least according to the numbers I'm finding). I suspect there are some tax incentives (which I haven't investigated yet) which make the numbers work even more easily for this kind of project. And I'm already aware of the renewable portfolio standards in California which will require that 33% of the electricity that a private utility sells to end-users come from so-called renewable sources, I'm sure that factors into the economics of this kind of project as well. But it seems that this deal is not only good for Apple, but good by a fair bit - meaning, we must be getting near the point that those tax incentives and policy aids will no longer be needed. A quick look at First Solar's annual report suggests that the power - cost efficiency for the panels themselves has improved dramatically in recent years.


EDIT: I suppose I should link to something more than the press release from First Solar. The title of the article below is a bit misleading I think. Apple isn't really building the solar farm, First Solar is. Apple has entered into a power purchase agreement to buy the output of 130 MW worth of capacity for the next 25 years. The project will create another 150 MW worth of capacity, the output from which Pacific Gas and Electric has agreed to buy.

Apple to build $850M solar energy farm in CA

 

[GURPS]

From Apple's perspective, and from the perspective of other companies that might enter into similar deals, they're basically just hedging future energy costs.

if it were me. I'd move the DC and manufacturing lines [US Based Stuff ofc], mostly under ground out in say NV or New Mexico in the middle of 200 acres of desert and cover a few square miles with solar panels .... or maybe one of those fancy solar towers with liquid sodium super heating steam


[putting the structures under ground reduces cooling requirements .... hell you could probably trench and bury several miles of pipe and forgo AC all together]

 

[b23hqb]

Ya think nhboy is the gopher boy on this project? It hasn't surfaced lately, or maybe it and Punxsutawney Phil are cuddled up and getting it on for the winter.

 

[GURPS]

he'll be back closer to the next election , to bombard us with Hildabeast for President Talking Points

 

[Hodr]

Your cost figures for a reactor likely do not include the decommissioning costs, which have been shown to be as expensive or more so than building the facility. That said, I don't think anyone could rationally argue against Nuclear energy in terms of efficiency or cost.

But the NIMBY folks are still too afraid of anything with the word Nuclear in it, and the up front costs too high, for Nuclear to expand to replace coal/gas power as it should.

Solar, while less efficient/effective is something that individuals and companies can pursue on their own. If I wanted to live "off grid" I could do so, and the combination of a couple of wind turbines, some solar panels, and a bunch of deep-cycle marine batteries while expensive is something I could provide for myself and after which I wouldn't need to rely on outside resources.

If instead I decided to run off of a gas generator, I would still be at the mercy of someone else who controls the flow of gas.