Salty Solar Steam

The Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project in Nevada was proposed in 2011 and completed in 2015.

This was a very ambitious program that sought to use new technology to build a plant that aimed to provide electricity for 75,000 homes throughout the state.

This was the first attempt to build a power plant that used this technology in the US. The concept was simple- use a bunch of mirrors to concentrate the sunlight on a central tank of liquid salt. The concentrated sunlight would heat the salt which would then boil steam that would then be used to turn turbines.

One of the most typical methods of creating electricity from fuels is to burn the fuel to boil water and create steam that turns turbines- all ‘old school’ or ‘main stream’ technology that we’ve relied upon since the early days of electricity.

One of the main issues with this type of technology is that the steam part of the system requires a lot of operators to monitor the operation and maintainers to keep the equipment running.

This is significantly different than a solar panel farm that has much fewer moving parts that need to be maintained. There’s less maintenance and little to no need for operators to monitor it.

At the time of being designed, building the mirrors so that they could track the sun and continue to point the concentrated solar energy aimed correctly at the central tower was new technology (sort of) as well. Turns out there were several issues that had to be worked out to get that part working correctly.

In all, the plant did start up and run for a few years. The cost of operating the plant was very high though and the cost per mega-watt-hour was over $100 where typical power plants were selling the power at more like $35. (It cost more than 4x to produce the power than other plants were selling it for).

After operating without a profit, the parent company filed for bankruptcy and the plant shut down. Recent attempts to get it started back up have prevailed and the plant now operates.

Scope out the story here:

“The Failure of America’s $1 Billion Solar Farm”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BU7IbZ0YVo

I find this to be an extremely interesting story because it involves visionary people taking a new technology and really trying to make it work. It has all the elements of struggle and perseverance in the face of failures, and it includes steam plants- which having operated those for 30+ years I am always curious about.

This story is also very important in the ‘climate wars’ on social media these days…
‘Climate Deniers’ will quickly point to this story and try to use it to discredit the effectiveness of solar power and even suggest that this proves solar technology is failed and not viable.

While I admire their disingenuous attempts to use this to discredit all solar power, the fact is this technology has nearly zero connection to rooftop solar tech. The only thing that might be common are the sun as a source and maybe that they’re both built using materials…

Anyways, this tech is still getting worked out while the rooftop solar has advanced to a point where it is viable, reliable, and in many cases affordable now. Especially with the extension of the tax credits in the IRA.

If you are curious about rooftop solar for your home or business, now is the time to check it out. They say a residential solar system was installed every three minutes in 2022, and it is going faster this year.

Click here to be notified when I release Tucson Solar Insider Desk Guide for Buying Solar- a book aimed at arming home and business owners with all the need before sitting down with a solar sales team.

Be Good!
Curtis