What is the largest solar plant which has ever been built?

How many solar plants would it take to deliver as much continuous and reliable power as one AP1000 plant? How long would it take to build them?

Westinghouse gets a scare from NRC
http://www.theenergycollective.com/TheEnergyCollective/49960

China, of course, is already building 10 of them as I type.

Not if they haven’t been approved due to safety concerns and its a nuclear power station.

How many solar thermal plants with adequate storage would have to be built to provide as much power as a single AP1000 plant?

Could the solar thermal plants be built where they could tie into the existing grid, or would it be necessary to spend huge amounts of $$ to accommodate the solar thermal plants?

Environmental organizations are concerned about the fragile desert environment, which is why senator Feinstein (D, CA) objected to a solar plant which would have covered 60 square miles of Mojave desert. Can we be sure that they wouldn’t mind covering tens of thousands of desert with solar thermal plants?

In my opinion, pressurized water reactors of the AP1000 type are obsolete; they require enriched uranium of which they waste about 99% and also require a large reactor vessel which is pressurized to more than 2000 psi. We should be designing and building LFTR reactors which use thorium as fuel instead of uranium. If that cannot be done quickly, we should be building CANDU reactors. They can use existing nuclear waste and natural uranium as fuel, thereby solving the existing waste problem.

Noticed a lot of references to Gen III+ AP1000 reactors, however as far as i’m aware these have failed to obtain NRC approval in the US due to “safety issues” with “sheild building”.

See here: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/news/2009/09-173.html

If solar thermal with baseload is commerically operating and AP1000 plants are yet to even be approved for construction in the US, wouldn’t it make sense to go for the first option?

Also good article about Obama’s plans for nuclear power in US here: http://www.southernstudies.org/2010/02/obamas-nuclear-generation-gap.html

Reality is that most talk of Gen III+ and Gen IV reactors is just cover for politicians to pursue a nuclear agenda on the basis of outdated technology.

Recently, Senator Feinstein objected to a solar PV installation in the (California) Mojave desert because the installation would cover 60 square miles of desert. The Sierra Club and other environmental organizations object to having trails in the desert for off-road vehicles because of the fragile nature of the desert environment. Thus, even if covering large desert areas with solar installations would provide sufficient power, it is likely that environmental groups would object. It is unclear just what means they would accept to provide sufficient power.

India has a population density 11 times greater than the U.S.; China has a population density 4.3 times greater than the U.S. In fact, our population density is lower than average. Considering that, even if we could collect sufficient solar power for our needs, it would be totally impossible for more densely populated countries to do so, a fact which is generally ignored. I wonder how the pro-solar crowd would expect Alaska to receive sufficient solar power.

The pro-solar crowd wants solar installations in the African Sahara Desert to provide power for the whole continent of Africa. The area available and the climate might make it possible, but I wonder whether they are aware of the huge sand dunes which continually move around, or where they expect to get the water to keep the mirrors clean, or who would keep the roads clear to provide access for maintenance, etc.

One would suppose that before embarking on a mission to install large solar plants and wind farms, careful calculations would be done to determine whether it is practical. It is difficult to understand why that has not been done.

Sorry, the first line of the second paragraph should say
“Solar trough is more developed at the moment. Solar tower may take over in the future.”

Needs (2008) compares solar trough and and solar tower.
http://www.needs-project.org/

Solar trough is more developed at the moment. Solar tower may take over in the future. However, there appears to be little difference between them in the projected cost of electricity. Both are totally uncompetitive. See herte for more, and take notice of what would be involved in building sufficent to make a significant contribution to our electrcity supply.
http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/01/09/emission-cuts-realities/

It would be interesting to have firm numbers to compare the trough system with the power tower system.

You might be interested in this report on the lessons from the Spanish renewable energy bubble:
http://www.juandemariana.org/pdf/090327-employment-public-aid-renewable.pdf

From memory, 2.2 real jobs lost for every ‘green job’ created.

18% unemployed in Spain

Real industries have left Spain for places where government policy is more stable and thus suitable for real industry.

The subsidies for solar have had to be stopped. The country is almost broke and cannot afford them

Wind power output has to be cut back and no more built.

You can check the details, I may have some of this wrong.

Here is another (this one from Germany):
http://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/germany/Germany_Study_-_FINAL.pdf

If you have an open mind, these should be sufficient to make you change your mind about renewables and nuclear.

1. Why has Britain chose to pursue nuclear power technology again? Why has Italy? Why has Sweden? What makes Spain different?

2. Why do you think Spain had no problem with handling 54% contribution from wind? Was it because there was 100% backup power for when the wind started to drop back?

3. If wind and CSP are economically competitive, why do they need these feed-in tariffs? If it is because they’re not yet economically competitive with coal or gas, then why shouldn’t Gen III+ nuclear power also have access to the same level of support?

4. Is Andasol-2 delivering power yet? (this is out of curiosity – when I wrote the above, it was not). Do you think it’s valid to compare the build time of a 20 MWe average facility (Andasol-1) with a 1500 MWe (the EPR, assuming 90% CF)? Or should we instead compare the cumulative build time of 75 Andasol-1 plants (and of course assume a reasonable amount of parallel construction)?

5. Why are the UAE plans “just hot air” and when you are happy to cite “Over 16,000 MW with planning approval” for CSP? Do you expect the UAE to cancel their agreement with Korea and switch to CSP? If not, why not, if CSP is more economic?

6. If Spain has seen the light with CSP, why hasn’t Australia, or the US? What do you think is holding them back?

Spain is case in point — out with Nuclear and in with Wind and Solar.

Spain abandoned its nuclear program
http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/inf85.html
at a cost of $6 Billion Euros in failed nuclear plants that never ever sent a kilowatt hour out to the grid. After years of construction, resources, shipping, labour spent NO POWER.

And with 7448MWe net of nuclear plants they know the cost burden of hosting a nuclear industry.

In recent times they’e managed to get their Nuclear plants operating at 80% Capacity factor (54TWh out of 65TWh theoretical) But it’s taken a long time since they started in 1964 with their first plant.

On Solar and Wind

Spain has 16,000MWe of Wind and will raise this to 20,000 by end 2010. Wind contributed 11.5% of the grids power last year including 54% on December 30 with no stability issues, they were able to kick in 600MW of curtailment automatically as you do with any modern computer controlled grid.

For the month wind outpaced nuclear contribution.

Under the current feed-in tariff

Spain has approved 6000MWe of wind for the feed in tariff for 2011,2012 and 2013 (2000MWe per year)

Spain has approved 1500MWe of Solar photovoltaic for 2011, 2012 and 2013 (500MWe) per year

Spain has approved 2440MWe of Solar Thermal plants, most with storage for 2011,2012 and 2013

The current feed in tariff of 27euro cents will be replaced by a new feed in tariff to be announced this year. In particular the Solar Thermal feed in tariff will drop to 18-21 euro cents about 30% reduction. The industry approves of this move and it is proof of the industryc can move significantly along the cost curve with support. This is why the Spanish government has chosen to back the cheapest energy sources of the future both Solar and Wind.

Contrast that with Finland and Areva the world’s biggest nuclear power companies adventure at olkiluoto Where a 2005 construction start time has blown out to 2012. It is likely that this plant will not be finished until 2015..

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2009/jan/14/areva-nuclear-finland-olkiluoto

As you can see the Spanish government wants the security and safety that if they back a power technology they actually get kilowatt hours delivered to their grid.

Andasol 1 was built in 18months and Andasol 2 was built in 9 months.

In a similair way Torresol 17MWe will be finished after 18months of construction, the 50MWe Alcazar will take just 12months after breaking down.

On the United Arab Emirates…

The UAEs plans are just hot air at the moment. They have not broken ground on anything. Where as Spain has 34 Solar Thermal plants, most with 50% (Troughts) – 75%(Towers) capacity factors. All these projects have broken ground, meaning mirrors, turbines, balance of plant, site works, earth moving you name it.

Unlike the “Announcement” for the UAE

2440MW of Solar Thermal under construction
http://office.beyondzeroemissions.org/fileshare/Spain_2440MW_in_construction.jpg

Over 16,000MW with planning approval (Jan 2009)
http://office.beyondzeroemissions.org/fileshare/Spain_15500MW_approved.jpg

So, why isn’t this happening? Why didn’t the UAE choose to build more than 5 GWe of CSP? If the UAE government made the wrong choice, why did they? What are the CSP manufacturers doing wrong? I’d honestly like to hear your speculation on this, as the same thing appears to be happening here in Australia — without massive subsidies along the lines of the solar flagships programme, nothing is happening.

See here for more comments on that point (scroll to bottom section of the post):

http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/01/28/tom-blees-in-australia/

The point of my post was that Sargent and Lundy LLC have been building power plants since year dot of Hydro, Coal, Gas and Nuclear plants . They are technology neutral and they have the highest reputation in the industry.

Sargent and Lundy is independent. and their cost reduction trajectory based on cummulative MW installed globally stands and will be repeated in the update with some adjustments to update some commodity costs having a minor effect on overall LCOE projections for each of the cummulative global installed capacity levels achieved.

Sargent and Lundy LLC was contracted by the US Department of Energy to conduct an independent due dilligence assesment of the US Government Solar Programs.

This was at a time when the Bush Administration wanted to cut back on the programs due to the influence of Exxon Mobil and co who were writing Administration energy policy.

This report is the GOLD STANDARD. Unlike the NEEDS report which does not have direct access to the Sandia Labs and NREL technology programs or the work of Bechtel, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Pratt and Whitney, Rocketdyne this report is the most comprehensive and has the most reliable cost projections as it focuses on 75% capacity factor 24×7 Molten Salt Power Towers.

Warm Regards,

Matt

LOL! (I’m guessing this is parody…)

Cool. One whole hour of backup. That’s so much better a use for 20 tonnes of DU than the 20GW.Ye you could get from it using a fast breeder.