This is what the world's largest solar plant looks like when it's catching rays

theverge ^ | February 13, 2014 01:44 pm | Jacob Kastrenakes

[oldplayer]

That’s not a light plane if I were guessing. Passenger in a commercial jet. He is 20 thousand feet high if he;s a foot. No matter, the point is the same.

Oldplayer

[Squawk 8888]

It could probably be re-purposed as a pretty impressive telescope.

[Steely Tom]

That’s not a light plane if I were guessing. Passenger in a commercial jet. He is 20 thousand feet high if he;s a foot. No matter, the point is the same.

Good call. I think you're right. He's way up there.

[Steely Tom]

Of course, that’s the focal spot being lit up by the mirrors. It’s desgined to absorb the light focused on it, but it probably only absorbs about 95% ( my guess. ) Note the mirrors are dark, since none of them reflects light towards the plane.

I know. That occurred to me too. It's nearly as bright as an arc welder, but the surface that's reflecting it is basically black. That's a bodacious amount of light, bro.

[dadgum]

And this power plant will pay for itself in....what? A million years?

What a crock of Libtard diaper-fillings.

[bubbacluck]

He describes (in the comments) a light source in the desert that he says is " ... blindingly bright, its center resembling something like when you look at a welder's torch"

At night you could probably see it from downtown LA!

Oh, wait...

[Uncle Chip]

Okay guys — you’ve had your rest — here it comes again — just like yesterday — all together now focus — focus — focus — you guys over on the right what are you looking at — c’mon focus — focus — focus — awwww dam birds.

[kabar]

And what is the costs of electricity to the consumer compared to carbon based energy?

[baddog 219]

[tatown]

The plant has a rated capacity of 377 MW.

[kabar]

According to U.S. Energy Information Administration data, the cost of building and operating a new solar thermal power plant over its lifetime is greater than generating natural gas, coal or nuclear power. It costs a conventional coal plant $100, on average, to produce a megawatt-hour of power, but that figure is $261 for solar thermal power, according to 2011 estimates. The figures do not account for incentives such as state or federal tax credits that can impact the cost.

[kabar]

The Mojave Solar Project is a solar thermal power facility under construction in the Mojave Desert in California, which is located 100 miles northeast of Los Angeles near Barstow. The 280 MW concentrating solar power (CSP) plant will cost an estimated $1.6 billion and should be completed in 2014. Abengoa has successfully secured a $1.2 billion loan guarantee from the US government for the project

[spokeshave]

Where are the pics of the birds being fried in flight?

It happens....birds think that the shiny panels are water....and get fried

[Secret Agent Man]

world’s largest bird cooker

[doorgunner69]

Drove by an earlier smaller version south of Ft Irwin twenty or so years ago, right off I40. Did not see the mirroe light, but the tower lit up with that torch heat was painful to look at.

Assume some damaging IR wavelengths, it truly hurt to look at.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

LMAO Fallout new vegas ? I love it great game ! Fallout 4 Philadelphia is coming out in a few months should be fun !

[Dapper 26]

They must order Windex by the truckload.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

http://greencorruption.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-rat-in-recovery-and-gang-of-ten.html#.Uv2rRGJdW6I

The RAT in the Recovery

What most don’t know, not even the majority of Congress, is that there was a RAT hidden deep inside the 1,073-page stimulus bill, which was drafted by the Obama transition team and congressional aides.

Entitled the Obama-Biden Transition Project, it employed approximately 400 people and it was comprised of Obama bundlers and campaign contributors as well as lobbyist and those that operate inside Washington’s egregious revolving door. In the mix was a squadron of Center for American Progress (CAP) experts, the billionaire George Soros-funded liberal think tank. Within this transition group, we also find many that eventually operated inside this clean-energy scheme, of which I’ll highlight later.

“From the first debates over the stimulus bill, the White House has promised unprecedented levels of transparency and accountability,” noted U.S. News in 2009, even appointing Vice President Joe Biden as the nation’s stimulus spending cop, Stimulus Sheriff Joe, who ultimately went MIA.

Quite the contrary, and it all started when Team Obama starting planning their trillion-dollar spending spree, because “deep inside” the 2009 Recovery Act was a RAT, an attempt to suppress potential investigations, and only a few news outlets caught it in February of 2009: the Washington Post and the Washington Examiner.

As legislation was moving at rapid speed, and Congress continually failed to read the bills, the Obama administration had placed a “far-reaching and potentially dangerous provision.” The creation of the RAT Board (Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board) was supposed to be “an oversight panel headed by a White House nominee.”

The controversial provision emerged in a January 2009 draft of the bill prepared by Obama’s transition team officials and members of the House Appropriations Committee, of which at that time it was labeled by the White House as “critical to prevent waste and corruption.” This RAT board gave them the authority to ask, “That an inspector general conduct or refrain from conducting an audit or investigation.”

Did you get that? An Obama appointee could dictate what to investigate and what investigations they wanted to squash.

[yawningotter]

A modern nuclear power plant that takes up about as much space as the buildings surrounding just one of those towers would produce much more energy, cause much less environmental destruction, and look a whole lot better.