solar updates reflective and PV for the world

Researchers at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) have conducted a study to examine the potential for solar power to provide reliable electricity around the clock, every day of the year. The team found that a large, distributed network of concentrated solar power (CSP) plants in the Mediterranean basin or the Kalahari desert in southern Africa would be able to consistently run at 80 percent of maximum capacity or more throughout the year regardless of time of day, season, or weather conditions.
The potential to generate solar power in the Earth's deserts is essentially unlimited: there is more than enough land area to generate far more electricity than the whole world currently demands.
And yet, generating such vast amounts of power using photovoltaic (PV) cells would be unpractical, mainly because PV panels can't produce electricity at night, and are also subject to changing seasons and weather conditions. A power grid relying mostly on PV panels would need a very large number of batteries, which would drive electricity costs up.

This is the first detailed study of its kind to establish that it is indeed possible to build a power grid which relies primarily on solar energy and still provides reliable electricity around the clock, day at night, and throughout the year. Moreover, the costs per kWh might start dropping dramatically over the next few years.

"The costs of CSP, even in their least cost configuration, are currently higher than gas (roughly 10 cents per kWh, compared to about 5 cents)," Patt told us. "But that will almost certainly change if CSP becomes more mainstream, and it is reasonable to imagine that it will be as cheap as gas within the next 10 to 15 years. In a sense, our latest results provide a reason for energy system planners to push CSP to the point where this [cost reduction] will happen."

Although it's getting increasingly common to see solar panels on the roofs of homes, household wind turbines are still a fairly rare sight. If Rotterdam-based tech firm The Archimedes has its way, however, that will soon change. Today the company officially introduced its Liam F1 Urban Wind Turbine, which is said to have an energy yield that is "80 percent of the maximum that is theoretically feasible." That's quite the assertion, given that most conventional wind turbines average around 25 to 50 percent.
The 75-kg (165-lb) 1.5-meter (5-ft)-wide Liam obviously doesn't look much like a typical turbine. It draws on the form of the nautilus shell, and the screw pump invented by ancient Greek mathematician Archimedes of Syracuse.
That form factor reportedly results in minimal mechanical resistance, allowing it to spin very freely and to operate quietly – blade noise is one of the common complaints regarding rooftop wind turbines. Additionally, the design is claimed to keep it always pointing into the wind for maximum yield.

The mayor of this sunny state capital, Esthela Ponce, says the Mexican president is expected to pay an inaugural visit to the solar farm soon, ushering in a new era of renewable energy for La Paz and the rest of the country.
Built on the site of an abandoned agricultural operation, the solar farm is linked via a high-voltage transmission line with the local-area power grid at the Olas Altas substation 3 km to the south, to which it began supplying power in September.
Aura Solar I is Mexico’s premiere utility-scale photovoltaic (PV) power producer, as well as the first domestic private enterprise of its size to obtain both a development bank loan and an agreement to sell its electricity to the grid.
“The idea is to see how this type of merchant-risk deal can be replicated down the road, not only in Mexico and Latin America, but around the world,” said Hector Olea, president and CEO of Gauss Energía, the construction contractor for the project.
The $100 million installation of nearly 132,000 solar-panel modules on 100 hectares has the capacity to generate 30 megawatts (MW) of electricity - enough for 164,000 people, or 65 percent of La Paz households, year-round.
It is expected to replace output from local fossil-fuel facilities, reducing emissions of carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide, sulfur oxide and particulates. In all, it will cut greenhouse gas emissions by 60,000 tonnes a year, according to the World Bank Group’s International Financing Company (IFC).

The 266MW plant is expected to be operational in 2014. Source: 8minutenergy Renewables.

Silver Ridge Power, formerly AES Solar, has around 522MW of in operation or under construction making it one of the world’s largest owners and operators of utility-scale PV plants.
This is Google’s thirteenth renewable energy investment. In total, the company has committed over $1 billion to projects that will enable the generation of more than 2GW of electricity, enough to power over 500,000 homes.

The 290MW concentrating solar power (CSP) plant is now in its final testing phase, and once completed will be the first utility-scale solar plant to store energy to meet demand. Unlike other renewables, parabolic troughs can generate energy day and night using thermal energy storage. At full capacity, Solana can store energy for six hours. This storage allows clean energy to be generated and stored without intermittence. 
Solana began construction in 2010 after gaining a federal loan guarantee of US$1.45 billion. The total investment in Solana so far is US$2 billion, and the plant aims to be operating by the end of this year.
Solar technology developer, Abengoa is the managing partner, taking care of the management, operation and maintenance of Solana.  
Upon completion Solana, which spans 1,920 acres in Gila Bend, Arizona, will produce enough energy for 70,000 homes and reduce carbon emissions by half a million tonnes, compared to a natural gas plant. Solana will also reduce water consumption by 75%, compared to the amount of water used previously for agriculture.
Arizona Public Service (APS), the largest utility in Arizona has a PPA with Solana for all the electricity the plant produces.
More than 2,000 jobs have been created for the construction of Solana, with 85 permanent jobs and thousands of indirect jobs expected to be created, just through the supply chain with 165 companies across 29 states have been engaged with Solana.
Abengoa already operates 931MW of CSP, and has 710MW under construction.

The Solana Generating Station is a solar power plant which is under construction near Gila Bend, Arizona, about 70 miles (110 km) southwest of Phoenix, expected to be completed in 2013. It is being built by the Spanish company Abengoa Solar,^[2] and will have a total capacity of 280 megawatts (MW),^[2] which is enough to power 70,000 homes while avoiding around 475,000 tons of carbon dioxide.^[2]Its name is the Spanish term for "sunny spot".^[3]
Arizona Public Service (APS) has contracted to purchase 100% of the power output generated from Solana, to meet the Arizona Corporation Commission's (ACC) mandate that the state's regulated utilities provide 15% of their electricity from renewable energy sources by 2025. APS will pay about 14 ¢/kW·h.^[4] The Solana plant, originally planned to open in 2011, will cost an estimated $2 billion.^[5] In December 2010, Abengoa received a $1.45 billion loan guarantee to support construction of the plant.^[6]
The plant will employ a proprietary concentrating solar power (CSP) trough technology developed by Abengoa, and will cover an area of 1,900 acres (770 ha). Construction is expected to create about 1,500 construction jobs; once completed, the plant will employ 85 full-time workers.^[7][8] Solar thermal plants use substantially more water for cooling than other solar generating technologies. Nevertheless, theSierra Club supports the Solana plant, because it will be built on private land, and use "75 to 85 percent less water than the current agricultural use."^[9]
One of the principal advantages of concentrated solar thermal (CST) is that storage can be provided efficiently (99%/day)^[10] so that 24-hour output can be provided, and output can be scheduled to meet demand requirements.^[11] The Solana Generating Station is designed to provide six hours of storage.^[12]

China's tier I crystalline-silicon PV module manufacturers are on course to cut production costs to 36c per watt by the end of 2017, a reduction of 14c from costs at the end of 2012, according to a report from GTM Research published yesterday.

ARES’ technology uses heavy rail cars that are pushed to the top of a grade using excess power from renewable energy plants or when electricity demand is low. Then, when the wind drops, the sun stops shining, or electricity demand rises, the rail cars are released back down the hill, generating electricity through regenerative braking.

Because the system doesn’t rely on the use of water like the aforementioned ocean-based systems, the company says the technology is suitable for a wider variety of areas with minimal environmental impact. The company says the system can also respond to increases or decreases in demand in a matter of seconds, boasts a charge/discharge efficiency of 86 percent, and can deliver constant power for periods of up to eight hours.

ARES’ Director of Technology Development, William Peitzke told us to think of the system as basically a “grid-scale flywheel or battery, but one which is able to lock into direct synchronization with the grid providing heavy inertia for added grid stability.”

The company says its system is scalable and can be configured to provide grid-frequency regulation systems from 10 to 200 MW power and grid scale energy storage systems from 200 MW power with 1 GWh of energy storage, up to regional energy storage hubs of 2 GW power and 32 GWh of energy storage. ARES adds that its system also boasts a higher energy-to-power ratio than flywheels, a lower life-cycle cost than batteries and a faster ramp-up rate than pumped-storage.


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The company is currently in the middle of the permit process to construct a full-scale commercial 50 MW REM system in Pahrump, Nevada for the Valley Electric Association and the California Independent System Operator (CA-ISO). This system will extend the length of the track to 5 miles (8 km) and up the weight of the individual vehicles to 300 tons (272 tonnes). The single track will be on an eight percent grade and have 32 vehicles operating on it, each able to absorb or provide around 1.5 MW of power.

ARES CEO Jim Kelly adds that the system can "be deployed at around half the cost of other available storage technologies. Just as important, ARES produces no emissions, burns no fuel, requires no water, does not use environmentally troublesome materials and sits very lightly on the land.”

Troubled Chinese manufacturer Suntech Power Holdings is to supply PV modules for what is claimed will be Latin America’s largest PV array, a 30MW plant in La Paz, Baja California Sur in Mexico.

The 132,000 Suntech Ve and Vd panels will be installed by Portugal-based EPC firm Martifer Solar on a 100-hectare site.

Owned by Corporacion Aura Solar, the project is being developed by Gauss Energia, a leading Mexican energy project developer focused on renewable energy.

It is Mexico's first utility-scale solar project with a power purchase agreement from Mexico's federal power company.

E L McDaniel, managing director of Suntech America, said: "We are very excited to supply the panels for the largest solar field in Latin America. With Mexico's excellent sunlight and strong renewable energy demand, we expect to see excellent growth of PV in the region."

Henrique Rodrigues, CEO of Martifer Solar, said: "The construction of Latin America's largest PV plant confirms our best expectations for 2013. This is an emblematic project for Martifer Solar, in a region that, due to its irradiation characteristics, finds solar electricity as a viable and more competitive alternative, when compared with non-renewable energy sources.”

Hector Olea, CEO of Gauss Energia, said: "Aura Solar is the first project of a larger initiative that aims to become a platform to develop utility-scale PV facilities in Mexico. With Mexico's solar potential expected to reach around 2,000 MW by 2020, Aura Solar has broken ground in the PV sector, and it is paving the way for future projects in the field.”

The plant is expected to have a production capacity of 82 GWh/year and construction is scheduled to be completed in August 2013.

Construction for New Mexico’s largest solar power plant, the 50MW Macho Springs Solar Project, is now underway in Demming, Lunar County.

Golabal PV energy providers, First Solar, and electricity distributors since 1925, El Paso Electric, under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA), will generate green energy for 18,000 homes in southern New Mexico and west Texas.

500 acres of the Macho Springs land was acquired for the plant, on a commercial lease from the New Mexico State Land Office – which is responsible for more than 9 million acres of land in New Mexico.

Spanish solar developer Tentusol has announced plans for a 250MW unsubsidised solar “megapark” on up to 800ha of land in north-west Cádiz, according to reports.

At a press conference this week, the company said that the €275 million farm would be developed in five phases of 50MW each, with planning and construction taking between two and three years.

The first phase of the will be connected at the end of 2015, according to a spokesman for the company, with the final phase operational by 2017.

The overall facility, based at a site near the town of Trebujena, will contain a total of around 90,000 PV panels, and will generate around 420,000MW each year, providing power to around 117,000 homes, the company said.

Company board chairman Fernando López Gil was quoted as applauding the commitment of his company in bringing the scheme forward despite the Spanish government’s decision last year to end its feed in tariff regime for new renewables plants.

According to the company, the project will employ about 536 workers in each of the five phases, and create between 60 to 100 jobs during the operational phase.

Solar Systems, a subsidiary of ASX-listed company Silex Systems, has commenced operations at Australia's largest concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) solar power station located in Mildura, northwest Victoria.
The station, which is a grid connected facility, will be used to demonstrate of Solar Systems' Dense Array' CPV solar conversion system.
Once operational, the system will have a capacity of 1.5MW and will generate enough electricity to meet the needs of about 500 average-sized homes.
The electricity generated by the plant will be sold to Diamond Energy, under a power purchase agreement signed in December 2012.
Solar Systems has secured a $10m funding package from the Victoria State Government towards its Mildura demonstration facility and related product development programme.
The company has also secured additional financial aid from the Federal Government of Australia for the project.
Silex CEO Michael Goldsworthy said the commencement of operations at Mildura facility is a major milestone in the commercialisation of Solar Systems 'Dense Array' CPV technology.
"The first array consisting of ten dish systems has been successfully commissioned and is operational, with the remaining three arrays of 30 dishes to be brought online progressively over the next few weeks," Goldsworthy added.

As part of the next phase of the project, the company said it will expand the facility to 100MW with construction expected to start in late 2014, subject to successful operation of the demonstration site.
Solar Systems is also building a 1MW CPV demonstration facility at the Nofa Equestrian Resort near Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
The plant, which is expected to be operational by the third quarter of 2013, will represent the first offshore demonstration facility using Solar Systems' Dense Array CPV dish technology.

Australia’s largest listed clean technology company, Silex Systems, is well on its way to commercialising the solar technology of a collapsed predecessor after this week flicking the switch for a new power facility in Mildura, Victoria.
The facility is feeding 1.5 megawatts of power onto the national grid using highly efficient concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) technology. This is enough power to feed about 500 homes, Silex says. Silex plans to upgrade the complex to 100 megawatts with the help of $110 million of additional government grants.
Silex chief executive Michael Goldsworthy says the Mildura facility is a major stop in the commercialisation of Solar Systems’ technology.
“If successfully commercialised, the deployment of utility-scale solar power stations around the world has the ability to generate hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenues within a few years,” Goldsworthy says. “This could be a game-changing renewable energy technology.”
Silex bought the assets of collapsed technology developer Solar Systems in 2010 after the company failed to raise a required $100 million to roll out its plans. Silex spent an additional $20 million on reconfiguring Solar’s technology.
The Mildura facility consists of 40 dishes, each made up of more than 100 curved mirrors. These concentrate the sunlight onto receivers of densely packed solar cells which convert the rays to power at 43 per cent efficiency. This compares with around 20 per cent efficiency for standard silicon solar panels. The system takes up much less space for vastly greater amounts of power production than conventional solar.
A one-megawatt facility near Riyadh in Saudi Arabia is on track to be completed later this year as the oil-rich nation ironically seeks to generate more renewable power at home to free up its oil for lucrative export.
The Mildura plant received a $10 million grant from the Victorian government. The upgrade to 100 megawatts will begin construction in late 2014 subject to securing a power purchase agreement and the finalisation of funding arrangements, which include $75 million from the federal government’s Low Emissions Technology Demonstration Fund, and $35 million from the Victorian government’s Energy Technology Innovation Strategy Fund.
According to Bloomberg, the Mildura plant would be the third-largest CPV facility announced globally, and much bigger than the current largest, which is a 30-megawatt facility in Colorado.
Silex has a market cap of $361 million and develops a range of energy technologies. It is also working with US nuclear companies to roll out its next-generation uranium enrichment methods.

A new 30 MW solar photovoltaic power plant is currently being constructed in Mexico — in La Paz, Baja California Sur. Once completed, the plant will be Latin America’s largest photovoltaic solar power plant, providing enough electricity to power an estimated 160,000 households.
Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2013/05/29/latin-americas-largest-pv-solar-plant-in-the-works-in-mexico/#6AoozO88IteU6R3b.99

The solar power plant, situated on a large 100-hectare site, will feature about 132,000 modules installed on single-axis trackers once completed — generating about 82 GWh/year and offsetting around 60,000 tons of CO2 emissions. It is currently scheduled to be completed by August 2013.
The project will be the first utility-scale solar project under a Power Purchase Agreement contract (20 years long) between a private company and Comisión Federal de Electricidad, Mexico’s federal power company, and also represents a big increase in total solar capacity for the country.
“Martifer Solar’s experience and worldwide track-record were decisive during the analysis of the different proposals made by the main companies in the sector. Due to its dimension, this project in Mexico will open the way for the development of the photovoltaic sector in the country, where, to date, were installed 13 MW of PV projects”, says Hector Olea, CEO of Gauss Energía, a Mexican company specialized in project development in the energy sector, in the press release.
Mexico has enormous potential with regards to solar energy — 70% of the country has an insolation of greater than 4.5 kWh/m²/day. What that means is that by “using 15% efficient photovoltaics, a square 25 km (16 mi) on each side in the state of Chihuahua or the Sonoran Desert (0.01% of Mexico) could supply all of Mexico’s electricity.” It’s currently predicted that the country will experience a solar power boom in the coming years, likely allowing it to reach its goal of receiving 35% of its energy from renewable sources by 2026.

Read more at http://cleantechnica.com/2013/05/29/latin-americas-largest-pv-solar-plant-in-the-works-in-mexico/#6AoozO88IteU6R3b.99

Although Martifer Solar is currently constructing Latin America's largest solar project, Sonora80M believes it will have the last laugh with a 80MW facility within the next few years. Image: Martifer Solar
Sonora80M Group has signed an agreement to deliver 15% of energy generated at its planned 20MW solar park in Mexico to Ford Motor Company.

The solar park will be located in Hermosillo, in the state of Sonora in northern Mexico, and is expected to start operations in 2014.

Plans to build the park, billed at the time as Mexico's "first large-scale PV project", were confirmed in August 2012. It will use Portuguese EPC firm Martifer Solar’s Smartracker technology, a one-axis tracker which is said to optimise the installation’s yield by around 30% and maximise the power distributed to the grid.

Commenting on the delay from planning to implementation, Pablo Mayo Sanz, partner-director of Sonora80M, told PV-Tech: “The delay is due to all the legal requirements needed to complete the project. This project sells energy to seven municipalities in Sonora (as well as Ford Motor Company), and this kind of public-private structure is quite complex, and requires political approval before starting.”

Martifer Solar was awarded an EPC contract for a 30MW PV facility in La Paz, Baja California, Mexico last week, which it said would be the “largest PV plant in Latin America to date"

The new turbine is a tad larger than the 4K at 5.2 x 3.2 m (17.1 x 10.5 ft) and 756 kg (1,665 lbs), but the heftier size allows it to produce more energy overall while maintaining a small footprint. Even with the greater dimensions , the turbine still creates only a whisper-quiet noise level of 38 dB.

The VisionAIR actually generates less energy at 5.5 m/s winds (3,600 kWh/yr versus the 4K's 4,500 kWh/yr), but a lower rated wind speed might help it make up the difference. By dropping the rated wind speed from 12 m/s (26 mph) to 11 m/s (24 mph), the turbine reaches its maximum power output on slightly calmer days, leading to a higher average production over time. It may seem like a small change, but it could have a large impact under the right conditions.

Energy analysts at global investment bank Citigroup suggest that the cost of solar PV modules could fall beyond most expectations in coming years – and reach a cost of just 25c a watt by 2020.

The prediction is included in an analysis of the market forces that are likely to shape the world’s energy future in the coming year. We reported on the major part of that report last Thursday, but Citi’s estimates on the cost of solar PV are intriguing, because they are well below most forecasts.

The rate of decline in the cost of solar PV in recent years has confounded most experts, even the optimists within the solar industry itself, and it has certainly taken the conventional power industry completely by surprise.

Yet there is still great divergence of opinion about what the future holds, and what the anticipated rationalisation among solar module manufacturers might mean.

The US Department of Energy, for instance, says its Solar Sunshot program aims to get the cost of solar PV down to $1/watt by 2020 (50c/W for the modules, the rest in balance of systems costs) – a situation that would deliver energy at a levellised cost of around $60/MWh, making it cheaper than new coal and gas-fired generation.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance makes a similar forecast. Greentech Media recently lowered its forecast for solar modules to 42c/W by 2015. On the other hand, Australia’s official government forecaster, The Bureau of Resource and Energy Economics, suggests that the starting point is higher than most current estimates, and predicts solar PV will not fall much below $140/MWh by 2020, and then make little progress over the following decade.

Price per watt, or $/W is a common way to compare the capital costs of various forms of electricity generation. It refers to the number of dollars one would have to spend to buy a machine capable of producing one watt of electricity. It is calculated by dividing the total project capital cost by the amount of peak power (watts-peak, or "Wp") it can produce.
Coal power plants are generally one of the least expensive sources of electricity by this measure, at around $2.10 a watt.[1] Large hydroelectric systems can be even less expensive by this measure; the Three Gorges Dam is reported to have cost ¥180 billion (US$26 billion), about $1 a watt, but actual costs are widely believed to be much higher.[2] Solar panels are currently selling for as low as US$0.70c a watt (7-April-2012) in industrial quantities; the balance of system costs (inverters, racks, wiring, marketing) made the median price in 2011 of large (>100 kW) systems $2.60/watt in Germany and $4.87/watt in the US.[3] The price difference between German and US photovoltaic systems was analyzed in 2013 by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.[4] Large wind turbines cost about $2 a watt.[5] Natural gas-fired peaking power plants are around $6 a watt.[6]
The cost of electricity produced depends also upon how much energy each installed watt produces over the course of a year. In the US, photovoltaic (PV) panels will see an average of 4–5 hours per day [7] of full sun, so the effective capacity of solar power generation is 4.5/24, or about 20%. In 2011, statistics [8] showed that US installed solar power, PV and thermal, totaled 4.9 GW, which produced 7454 GWh of energy. If the sun were always overhead, the installed capacity of 4.9 GW would have produced 4.9 x 24 x 365=42924 GW hours, so the actual production was 18%.

SheerWind, a wind power company from Minnesota, USA, has announced the results of tests it has carried out with its new Invelox wind power generation technology. The company says that during tests its turbine could generate six times more energy than the amount produced by traditional turbines mounted on towers. Besides, the costs of producing wind energy with Invelox are lower, delivering electricity with prices that can compete with natural gas and hydropower.

Invelox takes a novel approach to wind power generation as it doesn’t rely on high wind speeds. Instead, it captures wind at any speed, even a breeze, from a portal located above ground. The wind captured is then funneled through a duct where it will pick up speed. The resulting kinetic energy will drive the generator on the ground level. By bringing the airflow from the top of the tower, it’s possible to generate more power with smaller turbine blades, SheerWind says.

As to the sixfold output claim, as with many new technologies promising a performance breakthrough, it needs to be viewed with caution. SheerWind makes the claim based on its own comparative tests, the precise methodology of which is not entirely clear.

"We used the same turbine-generator (with a given load bank) and mounted it on a tower as is the case for traditional wind mills," SheerWind told Gizmag. "We measured wind speed and power output. Then we placed the same turbine-generator system (subjected to the same load), again we measured free stream wind speed, wind speed inside the INVELOX, and power. Then we used the power-speed relationship over 5 to 15 days (depending on the test), and calculated energy in kWh. Six hundred percent more energy was for one of the days. [...] The improvements in energy production ranged from 81 percent to 660 percent, with an average of about 314 percent more energy."

All else being equal, it would seem to be the latter category that is the most useful indicator.

Besides power performance and the fact it can operate at wind speeds as low as 1 mph, SheerWind says Invelox costs less than US$750 per kilowatt to install. It is also claimed that operating costs are significantly reduced compared to traditional turbine technology. Due to its reduced size, the system is supposedly safer for birds and other wildlife, concerns that also informed the designers of the Ewicon bladeless turbine. Finally, the system also makes it possible for multiple towers to network, that is, to get power from the same generator.

Utility-scale availability of Invelox is slated for 2014.

Studies have already shown us how white-painted roofs can help cool buildings by reflecting sunlight, while "green" roofs beat the heat by blocking sunlight and providing a source of evaporative cooling. Now, a team of scientists from Stanford University have created a panel that not only reflects sunlight, but it also draws heat from within the building and emits it into outer space.

First of all, the panel acts as a highly-effective mirror, sending most incoming sunlight back from whence it came. Reflective surfaces can still get hot, however, which is where the device’s ability to emit thermal radiation (heat) comes into the picture.

When thermal radiation is blocked by the Earth’s atmosphere, it becomes trapped between the ground and outer space – this is what lies behind the greenhouse effect. The Stanford panel, however, is made from nanostructured photonic materials (including quartz and silicon carbide), that cause the radiation to be emitted at a wavelength at which the atmosphere is virtually transparent. This allows the radiation to pass freely through, into the freezing vacuum of outer space.

The panel is capable of a net cooling power of over 100 watts per square meter (10.8 sq ft). According to the researchers, this means that “a typical one-story, single-family house with just ten percent of its roof covered by radiative cooling panels could offset 35 percent its entire air conditioning needs during the hottest hours of the summer.” What’s more, the panels are completely passive, with no moving parts and not requiring any power source (including the sun) to operate.

Solar power holds the promise of clean, limitless energy, but it currently suffers from high costs and an inherent disadvantage of not working when the sun isn't shining. The Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is taking a best-of-both-worlds approach by developing a hybrid solar/gas system that increases the efficiency and reduces the carbon footprint of natural gas power plants.

The PNNL system uses a parabolic mirror to focus sunlight on a four by two-foot (1.2 x 0.6-m) chemical reactor lined with narrow channels 8.1 mm (0.318 in) wide. The sunlight heats natural gas in the channels next to a catalyst that breaks down the gas molecules into a mixture of hydrogen and carbon dioxide called synthesis gas or syngas. Connected to the reactor is a heat exchanger that collects waste heat from the reaction and recycles it back to the reactor to boost the process until 60 percent of the sunlight is converted to chemical energy. Tests indicate that the system allows a natural gas plant to operate at about 20 percent greater efficiency.

"Our system will enable power plants to use less natural gas to produce the same amount of electricity they already make," says PNNL engineer Bob Wegeng, who is leading the project. "At the same time, the system lowers a power plant's greenhouse gas emissions at a cost that's competitive with traditional fossil fuel power."It's no surprise that the system works best in areas with lots of sunshine and according to PNNL, it's adaptable to different sizes of natural gas power plant sizes with a 500 MW plant needing about 3,000 solar dishes. In addition, the syngas can also be used to produce synthetic fuels for vehicles.

PNNL plans to test the system at its campus in Richland, Washington as part of a program to increase the system’s efficiency and bring down the cost to a projected six US cents per kilowatt-hour by 2020 to make it competitive with conventional fossil-fuel plants. Also, methods aimed at mass producing the system will be developed at the Microproducts Breakthrough Institute, a research and development facility in Corvallis, Oregon, while industrial partner SolarThermoChemical LLC plans to manufacture and sell the system after development

Ontario, Canada has carved out a niche for itself as a hub of green technology. One of the latest clean tech innovations to come out of that province is DARWIND5, a vertical axis wind turbine (VAWT). Designed by Harvistor, it comes with a promise of more oomph than existing models for small-scale wind power generation. According to the company, recent tests showed that its technology can achieve 35 percent more kilowatt hours per year than current VAWTs for the same sweep area, besides operating at 25 percent lower heights than similarly priced market leaders.

Individually, each rotor has a longer power stroke than previously thought possible because the new airfoil shape flies upside down and right side up during key parts of rotation, like a stunt airplane doing a full loop. During rotation, the lift forces change twice from moving away from the shaft to moving toward the shaft, making for the longer stroke. All of these forces occur on the windward side of the turbine – any turbulence exits on the leeward side, where it doesn't affect the turbine. This avoids individual torque peaks, which are a major cause of wind turbine breakdowns

With nameplate power (capacity under ideal conditions) ranging between 500 watts and 1.5 kilowatts in a 1.2-meter (3.9-ft) working diameter, DARWIND5 operates at a speed that ranges between 4 m (13.2 ft) and 24 m (78.7 ft) per second. It doesn’t need a brake because it self-regulates the top RPM – until now, unregulated top speeds have been a problem with VAWT design. A cantilevered tilt mount design reportedly makes cleaning and repairing an easy task, allowing it to be done anytime without power production loss or delays.

In a typical desalination plant, pipes made from titanium or other expensive types of metal are an integral part of the process. Now, however, scientists have created a new type of piping material that is much cheaper to produce – potentially making desalination possible in countries that previously couldn’t afford it.

Ordinarily, hot water or gas is pumped through pipes composed of titanium or a high-alloy steel. That piping conducts heat from the water or gas, which is transferred to its outer surface, causing it to become hot. When seawater is then sprayed onto the outside of that hot pipe, its pure water content evaporates and is collected, while its salt content forms into a sludge on the pipe.

In an effort to come up with a less costly heat-conductive piping material, researchers from Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Technology and Advanced Materials combined a polymer with copper microfibers – the mix is as much as 50 percent copper, by volume. The resulting composite can reportedly still be processed like regular plastic, yet it conducts heat like metal.

Pipes made from the material are now being tested in a desalination plant, where gas heated to 70ºC (158ºF) is continuously being pumped through them. The scientists plan on assessing the material’s thermal conductivity along with its corrosion resistance, then tweaking the mixture as needed.

SolFocus joined with Mexican land and real estate developer Grupo Musa and U.S.-based energy developer Synergy Technologies LLC to announce the launch of a landmark solar power plant in Baja California near Tecate, Mexico.

The project, planned as a 450 MW total capacity, will be built in 50 MW tranches, with construction on the first tranche starting in late 2012 and being operational before the end of 2013. The power plant, which will use SolFocus Concentrator Photovoltaic (CPV) equipment, will be owned and operated by SolMex Energy S.A. de C.V., the new company formed by Grupo Musa and Synergy Technologies for the production of clean solar energy in Mexico.

The scalable, modular system incorporates 52 mirrors – or heliostats – which are arranged on the ground around the base of the Tulip. They turn to track with the sun, reflecting and concentrating its rays onto the plant’s top-mounted “bulb” at all times of the day. This causes the air inside the bulb to heat to temperatures as high as 1,000ºC (1,832ºF). That ultra-hot air is then used to run a turbine generator.

The plant has an output capacity of 100 kilowatts-equivalent – reportedly enough to power 60 to 80 homes.

The cost for energy from this plant is projected to be 13.5 cents per kilowatt-hour and will go up 1 percent a year during its 25-year power purchase agreement. That's cheaper than a new nuclear power plant or a coal plant with carbon capture and storage, but more expensive than a new natural gas plant, Smith said



"This technology has been well proven. (But) this is project No. 1, so it's like a hand-crafted large-scale project," he said. "The key for future projects is to make improvements on the pricing."

Spain's ULMA Agrícola consortium and Tecnalia research center have developed a new type of photovoltaic solar panel for greenhouses that can generate electricity without an adverse effect on the crops grown within, while additionally providing cooling in summer. The system is designed to exploit the annual oscillation - the variation in the height of the sun's path across the sky over the course of the year. In theory, no solar radiation is compromised over winter, but surplus radiation can be diverted to electricity-generation during summer.

Wind-power has rapidly evolved over the last decade to become a key part of the alternative energy mix with towering rows of turbines now dotting horizons all over the globe. One of the drawbacks to the conventional windmill approach is that they are still low to the ground, so why not go to where the winds are stronger and more consistent - up. Like the Magenn Air Rotor System, KiteGen technology is aiming to do just that. The system generates energy by guiding tethered kites over a predefined flight path in order to rotate a ground based turbine and, while only in the testing and planning phases, it looks to be a promising solution. The large wings (or kites) in the KiteGen system are driven by avionic sensors located in a dome base that also houses an electric generator. The control system is designed to automatically guide the kites in order to rotate the turbine and maximize torque. As altitude increases, average wind speeds increase as well. This is a factor that traditional wind turbines cannot compete against, since they are stationary and are generally only able to reach heights of 100m.

IDG News Service - 3M has developed a see-through film that turns ordinary windows into solar panels. It will go on sale next year.

The solar film, on display at the Ceatec electronics conference in Japan, is arrayed in narrow, translucent green strips with clear gaps between and then glued to windows in large patches. A square meter of the film can generate roughly enough electricity to charge an iPhone under peak sunlight, but still allows for high visibility.

The product currently generates only about 20% of the electricity that a traditional silicon solar panel does, and will cost about half as much, though the final price has not been decided.

But it is also far easier to install and takes up no additional space. 3M has strong expertise in adhesives, where its less technical products include Scotch tape and Post-it sticky notes.

"An average person could go to the store, buy some of this, and then bring it home and install it themselves," said Yasuhiro Aoyagi, a senior manager in the company's construction markets division.

He said it is made from an organic photovoltaic material that is printed on in sheets, and will come down in price as production increases. The film blocks or absorbs about 80% of visible light and over 90% of infrared light, so it also acts as a sunshade.

March 11, 2008 A new study published by utility-scale solar developer Ausra argues that over 90 percent of the electric grid and car fleet in the US could be powered by solar thermal power, reducing overall US global warming pollution by 40 percent in the process.

Given that it typically gets hottest outside when the sunlight is most direct, it would make sense to have air conditioners that were powered by the thermal energy from solar rays. Unfortunately, collecting enough of that energy in a cost-effective manner can be challenging. Now, however, a team of University of California, Merced students have created a solar thermal collection system that is said to be significantly simpler, cheaper and more efficient than anything that's come before.

Because the system has such a wide field of view of the sky, it is also able to operate even on hazy days, scavenging sufficient heat even from indirect sunlight.

In tests of the technology, the system was reportedly able to reach a solar thermal efficiency of 60 percent at temperatures up to 400F (204C). "The efficiency of 60 percent refers to 60 percent of the sun's irradiance being converted into 'thermal' energy" UC Merced's Ron Durbin explained to us. "This is quite different than a photovoltaic system that converts 15-20 percent of the sun's irradiance into electricity."

AguaCalienteSolarProject
Located on 2,400 acres of farmland in Yuma County, Arizona near the communities of Dateland and Hyder, the Agua Caliente Solar Project is a 290 megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic (PV) generating facility developed by NextLight Renewable Power, LLC.

On April 28, 2010, NextLight and First Solar announced a definitive agreement for First Solar to acquire NextLight. The acquisition was completed on July 12, 2010. First Solar is a leading manufacturer of PV solar panels and provider of solar solutions. The acquisition brings a number of benefits to the project, including First Solar’s advanced thin film technology and its engineering, procurement, and construction expertise.

When fully operational, the 290MW Agua Caliente Solar Project will generate enough clean solar energy to serve the needs of about 100,000 average homes per year, displacing approximately *220,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) per year—the equivalent of taking about 40,000 cars off the road. Construction on the Agua Caliente Solar Project is planned to begin in late 2010. Pacific Gas & Electric Company has contracted to purchase the project's output for 25 years

The continued construction and eventual interconnection of what will be the world’s largest solar PV power plant now seems assured. The US Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office has finalized a $967 million loan guarantee for the 290MW (AC) Agua Caliente solar project in Arizona, thus triggering the purchase close of the project by NRG Energy from First Solar, which was contingent on the closing of the guarantee.

Electricity from Agua Caliente will be sold under a 25-year power purchase agreement with Pacific Gas and Electric. At full capacity, the electricity generated by the PV project will be enough to serve more than 225,000 homes and will offset approximately 5.5 million metric tons of CO2 over 25 years.

Google has chipped in a US$168 million investment in what will be the world's largest solar power tower plant. To be located on 3,600 acres of land in the Mojave Desert in southeastern California, the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System (ISEGS) will boast 173,000 heliostats that will concentrate the sun's rays onto a solar tower standing approximately 450 feet (137 m) tall. The plant commenced construction in October 2010 and is expected to generate 392 MW of solar energy following its projected completion in 2013.

Although solar power tower development is currently less advanced than the more common trough systems, they offer higher efficiency and better energy storage capabilities. Parabolic trough systems consist of parabolic mirrors that concentrate sunlight onto a Dewar tube running the length of the mirror through which a heat transfer fluid runs that is then used to heat steam in a standard turbine.

Solar power tower systems such as the ISEGS on the other hand focus a large area of sunlight into a single solar receiver on top of a tower to produce steam at high pressure and temperatures of up to 550 ° C (over 1,000° F) to drive a standard turbine and generator. The ISEGS also uses a dry-cooling technology that reduces water consumption by 90 percent and uses 95 percent less water than competing solar thermal technologies. Water is also recirculated during energy before being reused to clean the plant's mirrors.

The entire complex will consist of three separate plants developed by BrightSource Energy that will be built in phases between 2010 and 2013. The energy generated from all three plants will be enough to supply more than 140,000 homes in California during peak usage hours, with the project contracted to provide 1,300 MW to Southern California Edison and 1,310 MW to Pacific Gas and Electric Company.

An ambitious solar energy project on a massive scale is about to get underway in the Arizona desert. EnviroMission is undergoing land acquisition and site-specific engineering to build its first full-scale solar tower - and when we say full-scale, we mean it! The mammoth 800-plus meter (2625 ft) tall tower will instantly become one of the world's tallest buildings. Its 200-megawatt power generation capacity will reliably feed the grid with enough power for 150,000 US homes, and once it's built, it can be expected to more or less sit there producing clean, renewable power with virtually no maintenance until it's more than 80 years old. In the video after the jump, EnviroMission CEO Roger Davey explains the solar tower technology, the Arizona project and why he couldn't get it built at home in Australia.

Mexico expects foreign investment in renewable energy to almost triple this year to $8 billion, helping U.S. states such as California to slash carbon emissions, said the head of the Latin American nation’s investment promotions agency.

ProMexico, as the agency is known, is in talks with European and U.S. wind and solar-power companies for four to five projects this year, compared with four projects totaling $3 billion in 2010, agency chief Carlos Guzman said in an interview in London today. Companies with operations in Mexico, such as Italy’s Enel SpA, Spain’s Iberdrola SA (IBE), Acciona SA (ANA) or Abengoa SA could make additional investments, he said.