Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Phoenix firm to build huge solar farm
MSNBC ^ | Aug. 14, 2005 | Adam Kress

Posted on 08/15/2005 8:31:47 PM PDT by nickcarraway

click here to read article


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-48 next last
To: nickcarraway
I'm getting sick of reading all these OUTRAGEOUS prices for things nowadays. A Billion dollars is a friggin lot of money. What gets me is how unbalanced pricing is, Today I bought a DVD player for my bedroom for 25 bucks and a case of of Sam Adams for almost 30 Bucks.
21 posted on 08/15/2005 9:39:17 PM PDT by mowowie
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: fallujah-nuker
I wonder how many Nuclear power plants could fit on the same footprint as the solar plant?

Roughly speaking, 49 assuming you could get about 1E6gpm of water to each of'm.
22 posted on 08/15/2005 9:41:51 PM PDT by sefarkas (why vote Democrat-lite???)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 20 | View Replies]

To: sefarkas

I remember reading a book from the AEC, written in the sixties. They had proposed a massive industrial complex built around nuclear power plants, I think it was like 20 or so, would put out about 20,000 MW when all were running. IIRC the mainly produced hydrogen by electrolysis from water, the hydrogen was used as a feed stock for chemical plants, which also used waste steam from the reactors. I think they may have also done some desalination, the name was shortened to nu-plex.


23 posted on 08/15/2005 9:57:11 PM PDT by fallujah-nuker (Atque ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appelant)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: gondramB
(250 000 000 / 50) / (365 * 24 * 10) = 57.0776256

Shouldn't that be 12 hours of daylight (or less to allow for clouds and sandstorms)? That would put it more in the range of $125 per MWH. The recently passed pork bill includes subsidies for solar and wind power, so that will bring the installed cost down, (and your cost up: did you vote to subsidize power to LA?)

24 posted on 08/15/2005 9:57:22 PM PDT by Peter vE (Ceterum censeo: delenda est Carthago.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Peter vE
(250 000 000 / 50) / (365 * 24 * 10) = 57.0776256 Shouldn't that be 12 hours of daylight (or less to allow for clouds and sandstorms)? That would put it more in the range of $125 per MWH. The recently passed pork bill includes subsidies for solar and wind power, so that will bring the installed cost down, (and your cost up: did you vote to subsidize power to LA?)
Hey, that last part wasn't nice - I just made a mistake. But your' right - 24 is not the right number - I don't even know if they get 12 full hours a day - it's got to be cloudy sometimes.
25 posted on 08/15/2005 10:01:50 PM PDT by gondramB
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: mowowie

I surmise that the DVD player was manufactured in Red China at prison/slave wages, and that half the price of the Sam Adams is taxes. ;)


26 posted on 08/15/2005 10:03:08 PM PDT by soundbits
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 21 | View Replies]

To: mmercier
...." some rare scorpion or other desert dwelling critter"....

BINGO! You win the prize. I have only heard once on TV and once in a magazine article the real reason this stuff won't work. To generate enough electricity to do a small town takes more land mass COMPLETELY covered with solar cells, than the city it provides for. The windmills are killing over 100,000 birds a year right now. How many of those are Spotted Owls, or rare woodpeckers or something, we don't really know. You can imagine the carnage if we went with wind farms all over the country. Besides the land masses involved, they are still impractical economically. If it made sense, we would be doing it already. There is enough wacko money(aka Soros, Buffett, etc), already out there if it made sense. What they want is you, the taxpayer to fund their boondoggles. If solar could triple in efficiency, or even double, maybe it would be worth the loss of land mass, but just think what land is going for in So California.

If every house had solar shingles covering the entire roof, maybe you could watch TV and run a fan and a couple of lights for free. But that 60 amp double breaker that runs the AC will still be fed by the light company.

Why the MSM keeps this myth alive about the greedy oil companies stopping progress beats me. If solar was the future, Exxon would buy the panel makers. GE is already big in wind. There is no money in it, ergo, it won't make it in a capitalistic economy.

Course, with the recent Supreme Ct decision, maybe we could just eminent domain California, Oregon, and Washington, and cover them with solar and windmills. That way we get rid of 3 blue states, and get some juice to boot. Put the people on reservations in Utah and Nevada or something so we can keep track of them and re-educate them. Maybe a special place for San Francisco in Kansas or something. Excuse me, my mind is wandering.

27 posted on 08/15/2005 10:22:39 PM PDT by chuckles
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: Peter vE

One wonders how much power they could get if they used a salt pond?

Applications for solar ponds include community, residential and commercial heating; low-temperature industrial and agricultural process heat; preheating for higher-temperature industrial process applications; and electricity generation. Heat extracted from ponds can also run absorption chillers.

Several U.S. organizations, in consultation with the Israelis—the leaders in solar pond technology—built a 0.8 acre (0.32 hectare) salt gradient solar pond on the grounds of a food cannery in El Paso, Texas.

The first application of the pond was to produce heat for the canning operation. The pond has been producing heat in this manner since the summer of 1986. The system operates at about 185°F (86°C) and delivering about 300 kilowatts (kW) of thermal energy.

In July 1986, the operators added a Rankine Cycle heat engine to the system. In September, it became the first in the United States to generate electricity, producing up to 70 kW.

In May 1987, the operators added a 24 stage, falling-film, low temperature desalting unit. In June, it began producing about 4,600 gallons of desalinated water per day (16,000 liters/day). In 1992, the facility was shut down due to a failure of its original XR-5 liner. The pond was reconstructed with a geosynthetic clay liner system and operations resumed in the spring of 1995.

REF: http://www.eere.energy.gov/consumerinfo/factsheets/aa8.html


28 posted on 08/15/2005 10:29:51 PM PDT by ASOC (Insert clever tagline here: _______)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: soundbits

Yup, thats pretty much the reason i guess. Maybe we should buy them solar panels from China too. everything is so wacked. I imagine soon enough even our Beer will be made in China.


29 posted on 08/15/2005 10:53:16 PM PDT by mowowie
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: bnelson44
Well that's a lot prettier than your typical "wind farm" - of course I trust these babies won't be reflecting the setting sun into driver's eyes on the interstate at sundown or sun up!
Cool pic!

Oops! Once last thing ... Night, Night. ;-)


30 posted on 08/15/2005 11:23:46 PM PDT by Tunehead54 (Nothing funny here ;-)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 12 | View Replies]

To: sefarkas
"For the same $2-3billion, a Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear power plant will deliver twice as much power to the grid."

But don't nuclear plants need a heck of a lot of fresh, running water for cooling?
31 posted on 08/15/2005 11:39:27 PM PDT by familyop ("Let us try" sounds better, don't you think? "Essayons" is so...Latin.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: fallujah-nuker
I wonder how many Nuclear power plants could fit on the same footprint as the solar plant?

None, since this is California, and entire cities would march into the desert and camp out there in order to stop construction of anything useful, since anything useful would automatically damage the liberals' tender psyches.

Oh, also, when you guys say to put up nuclear plants instead, factor in the fact that there isn't any cooling water out in the desert, and the costs of eventually shutting down the plant and finding somewhere - anywhere - to put the waste for the long haul. If you do that, a solar plant that actually is buildable seems a lot better than a nuclear fantasy plant about which wacko-liberal judges across the state are panting with excitement at the chance of stopping it in its tracks.

32 posted on 08/16/2005 12:06:04 AM PDT by KellyAdmirer
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 20 | View Replies]

To: KellyAdmirer

They've never done an air cooled nuke?


33 posted on 08/16/2005 12:12:18 AM PDT by drlevy88
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 32 | View Replies]

To: chuckles
But that 60 amp double breaker that runs the AC will still be fed by the light company.

For a McMansion maybe. Sitting outside my house is one that says 10 amps on the plate, and it has never failed to keep up with Mr. Sun yet.

34 posted on 08/16/2005 12:14:34 AM PDT by drlevy88
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]

To: nickcarraway
Some of the construction of the solar dishes will be done by Schuff Steel in Phoenix.

There's a stirling dish about that big at a landfill about 10 miles from my house in Phoenix. Don't know if it's the same company, but they were having trouble getting it to operate in this heat, and it hasn't been operational for several years.

35 posted on 08/16/2005 12:16:42 AM PDT by narby (There are Bloggers, and then there are Freepers.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: chuckles

In 1966, I drove a Post Office vehicle past Varian-Aeograph 6 days a week; and every week read another news story about how, "Varian was on the verge of a major breakthrough to cost-effective solar cells."


36 posted on 08/16/2005 12:21:37 AM PDT by ApplegateRanch (The Marching Morons are coming...and they're breeding more Democrats beyond all reason!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]

To: snowsislander

That's my question too. If solar mirrors are involved, what is the cost to keep them clean?


37 posted on 08/16/2005 1:07:09 AM PDT by jonrick46
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: nickcarraway
This a a billion dollar boondoggle. The technology to watch is nano solar technology which will render this crude method of energy production as obsolete. For a look at what is being developed check this out:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/01/0114_050114_solarplastic.html
38 posted on 08/16/2005 2:09:40 AM PDT by jonrick46
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: nickcarraway
This a a billion dollar boondoggle. The technology to watch is nano solar technology which will render this crude method of energy production as obsolete. For a look at what is being developed check this out:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/01/0114_050114_solarplastic.html
39 posted on 08/16/2005 2:10:19 AM PDT by jonrick46
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: nickcarraway

I'd bet it would be a ball to work on this project as an engineer, but not as a maintenance technician! 20,000 Stirling engines, I wonder what the major service interval is.

So far it looks like only a very few units have been built, with max test life at about 1K Hrs. Only the government would sign a contract for 20K units based on that kind of validation history. Hopefully the contract is only for the 40 units for the initial "1MW" facility with follow on purchase contingent upon performance.

Personally, I'd love to get a look at their lifetest data, design controls, and production plan. Sounds like they're counting on hitting a lot of home runs. Good luck.


40 posted on 08/16/2005 2:21:09 AM PDT by Jack of all Trades
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-48 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson