Also, I'm wondering why the enviros are protesting against those solar panels covering up the beautiful desert flora. It is really magnificent in the early spring after a wet winter...
Posted on 03/01/2008 3:28:56 AM PST by PeaceBeWithYou
Abengoa Solar Purchases 3,000 Acres for $1 Billion Solana Generating Plant
Abengoa Solar, a Spanish-based solar energy company, has purchased roughly 3,000 acres near Gila Bend, AZ, where it intends to develop the world's largest solar power plant.
An investment entity associated with Brandon Wolfswinkel of Tempe, AZ, sold the land for $45.12 million, or about $14,700 per acre.
Abengoa Solar, which has solar plants in Spain and northern Africa, will construct and operate the 280-megawatt, $1 billion facility known as the Solana Generating Plant. The plant will use thousands of giant mirrors covering 1,900 acres to harness the sun's heat (rather than its light) to turn steam turbines, generating electricity.
The plant is scheduled to go into production in 2011. It will be able to power 70,000 households while avoiding more than 400,000 tons of greenhouse gas emissions, according to Abengoa.
Arizona Public Service, the state's largest utility, has agreed to purchase the energy from Abengoa over the next 30 years. "This is a major milestone for Arizona in our efforts to increase the amount of renewable energy available in the United States," stated Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano. "Arizona is leading the way in protecting our world for future generations through increasing the amount of renewable energy, combating climate change, fighting for air quality and much more. This plant will offer Arizonans a clean and efficient source of energy."
“The rat plan involves much less future consumption. Future increases in energy costs will automatically lead to lower consumption. If higher prices do not work, the rats will just ration the limited power.”
The rat plan includes slowing down our economy.
The ignorance here is amazing. A barrel of oil does not just go into our fuel tanks.
Around 50% of the refining process produces other essential products like roads, (Asphalt) tires, vinyl, rubber, paint, medical supplies, plastics, (the computer you sit in front of.) fertilizers for agriculture, road/runway deicers, anti-freeze for your radiator, clothing, shoes, and the list is long.......They pretty much could not build a Hybrid auto without it.
So just remember, our lives as we know it would come to a screeching halt without oil.
Modern Marvels had segment on green power. There’s a plan in Australia to build an even larger solar plant based on heat. The difference in projects is that instead of mirrors, they build a large concrete tube(stack) Skyscrapper tall, and put some sort of polymer skirt around the base a hundred feet or so above the ground, spread out far and wide. The sun heats the trapped air under the skirt and is directed towards the base of the stack (the skirt is higher at the base of the stack than it is towards the outer edges) where there are wind generators. Convection takes care of the rest.
or if it was just open land?
I was appalled at the per acre price of the land. They can make money buying land with a 14,000 plus price? They could have stayed south of the border, leased the land at 100 per acre for 100 years, and kept the deal from looking like a major scam.
Speaking of scams, the latest info from the wind energy front, is that the infrastructure necessary to transport electrical energy from the location of production to the point of use, is full.
In order to utilize newer production, we need to first invest in the lines to transport said energy from north to south and east to west. Wind farms are on a waiting list to inject their product onto the lines, because at the moment there is insufficient infrastructure available. Paraphrase of newspaper article.
The mirrors are shining the light onto the central unit. It would be dumb to make mirrors oversize, so that they were reflecting extra light back into the sky. And any such light will glint from only one mirror at a time, because the pilot would be far from the focus.
Oh the arrogance and stupidity of the average democrat in public office. This is how we combat climate change. The premise that man can combat or control climate change is a false premise to begin with. Hell, man can’t even control himself.
$200 is the base cost to fund the plant’s construction. The actually costs passed on to the consumer each month will be significantly higher then that
those who remember the seventies, three mile island, MUSE concerts and solar tax credits will understand when I ask for the “Aw geez, not this sh##t again” graphic.”
This system, like most large scale solar proposals uses mirrors not solar cells. They capture and focus radiant heat to create steam to drive generators. I can assure you from past experience, it is very easy to boil water in the Arizona sun.
Also, I'm wondering why the enviros are protesting against those solar panels covering up the beautiful desert flora. It is really magnificent in the early spring after a wet winter...
I suspect there was an incentive somewhere in the deal to retire irrigated farmland, thus freeing scarce water resources for residential purposes.
They will likely use molten salt as a heat sink, allowing them to generate consistent steam even when it is dark, as with Solar Two.
Too bad it’s not a nuke plant instead. Waste of land.
Your figures concur with data generated by the Union of Concerned Scientists about 25 years ago for very similar project proposals. Their leftward politics notwithstanding, the UCS relied on real data and hard science. This has been the preferred solution they advanced and it appears now the market is catching up to them.
The bitch is, there is nothing in the technology or engineering of this kind of generation that could not have been begun after the first oil shocks of the seventies, and if it had, the desired conversion could be completed by now.
You can thank corruption on both sides of the aisle for the fact we still live unnecessarily high on the energy food chain.
Check out my previous posts- it is NOT all desert around there, there is irrigated farm land and this was an alfalfa field. However there is a lot of desert in the area, just as you are thinking about where they could put this.
A lot of it is, a lot is privately held.
98 posts and not one about where the water is going to come from?
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