[Zeppo]

But there are some economic benefits: It created 400 jobs for draftsmen, carpenters and others whose work dried up as the southwest Florida housing boom came to a closure and the recession set in. Once running, it will require few full-time employees.

And as we all know, if they had constructed a coal-fired or natural gas plant, it would not have created any jobs.

Er, well, no, actually it would have created plenty of jobs, not only during construction, but also when the plant would have been running...

IMHO there's nothing wrong with creating a "proof of concept" solar plant of this size in order for a utility to gain experience in the construction process and hurdles as well as in both operating and maintenance, along with providing a benchmark for operational life calculations. It's also a useful test case for comparing construction and operating costs with fossil-fuel generating plants and nuclear plants.

Serious problems will arise, though, if this one is intended to be replicated with the goal of replacing or even just supplementing other types of generation, because the net result will probably be to decrease the flexibility and reliability of the system (for example, due to lack of excess generated energy storage and lack of evening/night generation capabilities).

[ColdWater]

IMHO there's nothing wrong with creating a "proof of concept" solar plant of this size in order for a utility to gain experience in the construction process and hurdles as well as in both operating and maintenance, along with providing a benchmark for operational life calculations.

Except that it is not driven by normal decision making processes. It is driven by politicians..