Over the last couple of years, there has been very little talk of India becoming one of the biggest markets for concentrating solar power (CSP). Today, however, many factors are coming together which show me that the country will start to lead the industry.
Full Story
Showing posts with label Solar energy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Solar energy. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Saturday, November 13, 2010
Friday, August 13, 2010
World's first solar power plant that can work at night. ScientificAmerican.com
By David Biello
How can one use solar energy after the sun sets? Simple: store the sun's heat in molten salts.
The world's first solar power plant to employ such technology—a thermal power plant that concentrates the sun's rays with mirrors on long, thin tubes filled with the molten salt—opened in Syracuse, Sicily, on July 14. Dubbed Archimede—after the famous Syracusan scientist Archimedes who supposedly coined the term "Eureka" for scientific discovery and reputedly repelled a Roman fleet through the use of mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays and burn the invading ships—the power plant can harvest enough heat to generate five megawatts of electricity, day or night, and can store enough energy to keep producing power even at night or during cloudy daytime hours.
In addition to the benefit of storage, molten salts also operate at a higher temperature (roughly 550 degrees Celsius) enabling them to capture more of the sun's energy—as well as create the steam for turbines in conventional power plants. Meaning that such solar thermal power plants could be swapped in for fossil fuel-burning ones. This power plant is on the grounds of a natural gas combined-cycle power plant.
The molten salts also don't burn like the oils used as working fluids in other concentrating solar power plants operating today. If Archimede springs a leak, it will end up with piles of fertilizer (the salts in question are potassium and sodium nitrates, which are literally used as fertilizer in agricultural applications). Of course, the freezing point of such salts is a balmy 220 degrees C so Archimede will have to capture a lot of heat to keep the salts fluid. That's why the plant's owner—Italian energy giant Enel—is supplementing the sun's rays with a little old-fashioned natural gas burning as well.
Of course, it requires 30,000 square meters of special parabolic mirrors and 5,400 meters of high heat-resistant pipe to collect the sun's rays in the molten salts, even in Syracuse. All that adds up to a building cost of roughly $80 million for just 5 megawatts of electricity. But Italy is hardly alone in pursuing such plants: the Andasol power plants in Spain use more than 28,000 metric tons of such salts to store thermal energy from its otherwise conventional concentrating solar power plants and the U.S. company SolarReserve plans to deploy such molten salt technology in its "power towers" coming soon to the Nevada desert. Eureka!
Source
How can one use solar energy after the sun sets? Simple: store the sun's heat in molten salts.
The world's first solar power plant to employ such technology—a thermal power plant that concentrates the sun's rays with mirrors on long, thin tubes filled with the molten salt—opened in Syracuse, Sicily, on July 14. Dubbed Archimede—after the famous Syracusan scientist Archimedes who supposedly coined the term "Eureka" for scientific discovery and reputedly repelled a Roman fleet through the use of mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays and burn the invading ships—the power plant can harvest enough heat to generate five megawatts of electricity, day or night, and can store enough energy to keep producing power even at night or during cloudy daytime hours.
In addition to the benefit of storage, molten salts also operate at a higher temperature (roughly 550 degrees Celsius) enabling them to capture more of the sun's energy—as well as create the steam for turbines in conventional power plants. Meaning that such solar thermal power plants could be swapped in for fossil fuel-burning ones. This power plant is on the grounds of a natural gas combined-cycle power plant.
The molten salts also don't burn like the oils used as working fluids in other concentrating solar power plants operating today. If Archimede springs a leak, it will end up with piles of fertilizer (the salts in question are potassium and sodium nitrates, which are literally used as fertilizer in agricultural applications). Of course, the freezing point of such salts is a balmy 220 degrees C so Archimede will have to capture a lot of heat to keep the salts fluid. That's why the plant's owner—Italian energy giant Enel—is supplementing the sun's rays with a little old-fashioned natural gas burning as well.
Of course, it requires 30,000 square meters of special parabolic mirrors and 5,400 meters of high heat-resistant pipe to collect the sun's rays in the molten salts, even in Syracuse. All that adds up to a building cost of roughly $80 million for just 5 megawatts of electricity. But Italy is hardly alone in pursuing such plants: the Andasol power plants in Spain use more than 28,000 metric tons of such salts to store thermal energy from its otherwise conventional concentrating solar power plants and the U.S. company SolarReserve plans to deploy such molten salt technology in its "power towers" coming soon to the Nevada desert. Eureka!
Source
Friday, July 9, 2010
Solar-powered plane lands safely after 26-hour flight. BBC News
8 July 2010
The solar-powered plane lands near Bern
An experimental solar-powered aircraft launched on Wednesday has landed safely in Switzerland after successfully flying through the night.
The feat is a step toward the makers' aim of circling the globe using the power of the Sun to fuel the plane.
The aircraft used super-efficient solar cells and batteries to stay in the air after the Sun's rays had faded.
The plane touched down at an airfield about 30 miles (50 km) from the Swiss capital Bern at 0900 (0700 GMT).
The plane landed at Payerne airport after a total flight time of 26 hours.
During the flight it reached a height of 8,700 m (28,543 ft).
Assistants rushed to stabilise the experimental aircraft as it touched down, ensuring that its huge 63m (207ft) wingspan did not scrape the ground and topple the plane.
It is the longest and highest flight recorded by a solar-powered plane.
The four-engine aircraft was steered by Andre Borschberg, a former fighter jet pilot from Switzerland.
The plane has 12,000 solar cells arranged on its wingspan which collected enough energy to power the plane for the flight.
Read Full Story:
The solar-powered plane lands near Bern
An experimental solar-powered aircraft launched on Wednesday has landed safely in Switzerland after successfully flying through the night.
The feat is a step toward the makers' aim of circling the globe using the power of the Sun to fuel the plane.
The aircraft used super-efficient solar cells and batteries to stay in the air after the Sun's rays had faded.
The plane touched down at an airfield about 30 miles (50 km) from the Swiss capital Bern at 0900 (0700 GMT).
The plane landed at Payerne airport after a total flight time of 26 hours.
During the flight it reached a height of 8,700 m (28,543 ft).
Assistants rushed to stabilise the experimental aircraft as it touched down, ensuring that its huge 63m (207ft) wingspan did not scrape the ground and topple the plane.
It is the longest and highest flight recorded by a solar-powered plane.
The four-engine aircraft was steered by Andre Borschberg, a former fighter jet pilot from Switzerland.
The plane has 12,000 solar cells arranged on its wingspan which collected enough energy to power the plane for the flight.
Read Full Story:
Monday, June 28, 2010
SunPower Sets Solar Cell Efficiency Record at 24.2%. RenewableEnergyWorld.com
Published: June 24, 2010
California, United States -SunPower Corp. has produced a full-scale solar cell with a sunlight to electricity conversion efficiency of 24.2 percent at its manufacturing plant in the Philippines. This is a new world record for large area silicon wafers, and has been confirmed by the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL).
Read Full Story:
California, United States -SunPower Corp. has produced a full-scale solar cell with a sunlight to electricity conversion efficiency of 24.2 percent at its manufacturing plant in the Philippines. This is a new world record for large area silicon wafers, and has been confirmed by the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL).
Read Full Story:
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Video: Up Close and Personal with Stirling Energy's CSP. RenewableEnergyWorld.com
The Maricopa Solar project puts Stirling Energy Systems' SunCatcher to the test.
by Graham Jesmer, Video Producer
Published: June 21, 2010
Arizona, United States -- Just outside Phoenix, Arizona, sits a field of dishes reflecting the hot desert sun. Pulling up to the humming devices, installed by Stirling Energy Systems (SES) and Tessera Solar, the cars passing by on an adjacent road are dwarfed by their size.
This is the Maricopa Solar project, a 1.5-megawatt (MW) array of SunCatcher Systems (also known as the Stirling Dish Engine). In January NTR plc, which owns both SES and Tessera Solar, opened the plant after breaking ground just four months earlier.
Maricopa Solar is the first commercial project for the SunCatcher concentrating solar power (CSP) technology, which was designed and manufactured by SES. The SES SunCatcher is a 25-kilowatt solar power system that uses a 38-foot high, mirrored parabolic dish combined with an automatic tracking system to collect and focus the sun’s energy onto a Stirling engine to convert the solar thermal energy into grid quality electricity.
Read Full Story and Watch Video:
by Graham Jesmer, Video Producer
Published: June 21, 2010
Arizona, United States -- Just outside Phoenix, Arizona, sits a field of dishes reflecting the hot desert sun. Pulling up to the humming devices, installed by Stirling Energy Systems (SES) and Tessera Solar, the cars passing by on an adjacent road are dwarfed by their size.
This is the Maricopa Solar project, a 1.5-megawatt (MW) array of SunCatcher Systems (also known as the Stirling Dish Engine). In January NTR plc, which owns both SES and Tessera Solar, opened the plant after breaking ground just four months earlier.
Maricopa Solar is the first commercial project for the SunCatcher concentrating solar power (CSP) technology, which was designed and manufactured by SES. The SES SunCatcher is a 25-kilowatt solar power system that uses a 38-foot high, mirrored parabolic dish combined with an automatic tracking system to collect and focus the sun’s energy onto a Stirling engine to convert the solar thermal energy into grid quality electricity.
Read Full Story and Watch Video:
Monday, December 28, 2009
World’s Largest Solar Energy Office Building Opens in China. Inhabitat.com
A vast fan-shaped compound in China has officially taken the title of “largest solar-powered office building in the world“. Located in Dezhou in the Shangdong Province in northwest China, the 75,000 square meter structure is a multi-use building and features exhibition centers, scientific research facilities, meeting and training facilities, and a hotel – all of which run on solar power.
See more...
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Monster Waves on the Sun are Real. NASA
November 24, 2009
Sometimes you really can believe your eyes. That's what NASA's STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) spacecraft are telling researchers about a controversial phenomenon on the sun known as the 'solar tsunami.'
Read Full Story:
Sometimes you really can believe your eyes. That's what NASA's STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) spacecraft are telling researchers about a controversial phenomenon on the sun known as the 'solar tsunami.'
Read Full Story:
Friday, November 20, 2009
First test for record solar plane. BBC News
The prototype of a solar-powered plane destined for a record round-the-world journey has made its first trip across a runway.
On Thursday, the plane covered at least 2km at speeds of up to five knots on the landing strip in Switzerland.
This week saw the Solar Impulse plane outside its hangar for the first time, with tests of its motors and computer.
As wide as a jumbo jet but weighing just 1,500 kg, it will be piloted by Swiss adventurer Bertrand Piccard.
The plane's maiden flight is scheduled for February, and a final version will attempt to cross the Atlantic in 2012.
Read Full Story:
Friday, November 6, 2009
छतछतबाट घामको बिजुली: नागरिक
विश्वमणि पोखरेल
काठमाडौं, कात्तिक २०- उपत्यकाका घरधनीले छानाबाट बिजुली उत्पादन गर्न सक्छन्, विद्युत प्राधिकरणलाई बेच्न पनि सक्छन्। त्यसले हिउँदको चर्को लोडशेडिङ केही कम गर्न पनि सक्छ। प्रशस्त घाम लाग्ने यहाँका छतबाट सोलार प्यानलले के व्यवसायिक रूपमा बिजुली उत्पादन गर्न सक्लान्? सौर्य उर्जाविद् भने सम्पन्न घरबालालाई बिजुली उत्पादक बनाउने अवधारणामा सरकारसँग लविङ्ग गर्दैछन्।
पूरा पढ्नुहोस
Thursday, November 5, 2009
First Solar Powered Passenger Ship for Berlin. AlternativeEnergy
August 25th, 2009: Alternative Energy Manufacturers who are concerned not only about profit but about future too are developing such products that are clean and green and run on alternative fuels. Though currently clean and green products are costly, efforts are on to make them easy on pocket too. Solon SE is a Berlin-based solar company that has produced a zero emission solar ship. Berlin’s mayor Klaus Wowereit was present at a ceremony to launch the “SOLON.” It is Berlin’s first passenger ship deriving its power from solar energy.Solon SE also supplied the 24 solar modules with a capacity of 5.6 kWp.
Read Full Story
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)