Prospects For Solar Thermal Power

A  new solar thermal electric power installation in Boulder City Nevada uses arrays of mirrors to concentrate sun light to drive electric power generation. The cost of electricity for this plant is estimated at 15-20 cents per kilowatt-hour (kwh).

Many states, including California, are imposing mandates for renewable energy. All of that is reviving interest in solar thermal plants.

The power they produce is still relatively expensive. Industry experts say the plant here produces power at a cost per kilowatt- hour of 15 to 20 cents. With a little more experience and some economies of scale, that could fall to about 10 cents, according to a recent report by Emerging Energy Research, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Mass. Newly built coal-fired plants are expected to produce power at about 7 cents per kilowatt-hour or more if carbon is taxed.

That is at least double what cheaper sources of electricity cost in the United States. Can the costs really go down substantially with a bigger market?

While solar thermal still costs more than wind power predictable daylight hours and the ability to store the heat allows solar thermal to provide a more reliable power source.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, wind power costs about 8 cents per kilowatt, while solar thermal power costs 13 to 17 cents. But power from wind farms fluctuates with every gust and lull; solar thermal plants, on the other hand, capture solar energy as heat, which is much easier to store than electricity. Utilities can dispatch this stored solar energy when they need it--whether or not the sun happens to be shining.

Solar thermal doesn't have to be able to provide electric power 24 hours per day to be useful. If its cost could drop in half then solar thermal would greatly reduce the use of coal and natural gas and allow limited fossil fuels to last longer and pollute less..

One solar thermal facility in Nevada is claimed to use 400 acres for enough electricity to power 14,000 homes.

Acciona's plant, which began operation last year, produces 64 megawatts of electricity for the utility company Nevada Power, enough to light up 14,000 homes. The company's Spanish competitor Abengoa just announced a plan to build a 280-megawatt solar thermal plant outside Phoenix, which would be the largest such project in the world.

All you need is a lot of sun, a lot of space and a lot of mirrors — and NS1 has all of the above. 182,000 parabolic mirrors are spread over 400 acres of flat desert, creating a glistening sea of glass visible from miles away.

That's 35 homes worth of electric power per acre of land. Mind you, this is an area of the United States that gets above average amounts of sunlight. But this result suggests that use of solar thermal to power all homes would not use an inordinate amount of land - at least not in countries with lower population densities.

Solar thermal looks cheaper than solar photovoltaics and the heat from solar thermal can be stored to stretch into evening hours. But solar photovoltaics might have better prospects for lower cost reductions and it lends itself more easily to decentralized use and smaller installations on homes and other buildings.

By Randall Parker at 2008 March 06

Storing Solar Power Efficiently

Storing Solar Power Efficiently
Thermal-power plants could solve some of the problems with solar power by turning sunlight into steam and storing heat for cloudy days.

By Peter Fairley

Thursday, September 27, 2007

Solar proponents love to boast that just a few hundred square kilometers' worth of photovoltaic solar panels installed in Southwestern deserts could power the United States. Their schemes come with a caveat, of course: without backup power plants or expensive investments in giant batteries, flywheels, or other energy-storage systems, this solar-power supply would fluctuate wildly with each passing cloud (not to mention with the sun's daily rise and fall and seasonal ebbs and flows). Solar-power startup Ausra, based in Palo Alto, thinks it has the solution: solar-thermal-power plants that turn sunlight into steam and efficiently store heat for cloudy days.

"Fossil-fuel proponents often say that solar can't do the job, that solar can't run at night, solar can't run the economy," says David Mills, Ausra's founder and chairman. "That's true if you don't have storage." He says that solar-thermal plants are the solution because storing heat is much easier than storing electricity. Mills estimates that, thanks to that advantage, solar-thermal plants capable of storing 16 hours' worth of heat could provide more than 90 percent of current U.S. power demand at prices competitive with coal and natural gas. "There's almost no limit to how much you can put into the grid," he says.

Major utilities are buying the idea. In July, the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) signed a 25-year deal with Ausra competitor Solel Solar Systems of Beit Shemesh, Israel, to buy power from a 553-megawatt solar-thermal plant that Solel is developing in California's Mojave Desert. The plant will supply 400,000 homes in northern and central California when it is completed in 2011. Florida Power & Light, meanwhile, hired Solel to upgrade the 1980s-era solar-thermal plants it operates in the Mojave.

Ausra, meanwhile, is negotiating with PG&E to supply power from a 175-megawatt plant that it plans to build in California, for which it secured $40 million in venture financing this month.

What distinguishes Ausra's design is its relative simplicity. In conventional solar-thermal plants such as Solel's, a long trough of parabolic mirrors focuses sunlight on a tube filled with a heat-transfer fluid, often some sort of oil or brine.

The fluid, in turn, produces steam to drive a turbine and produce electricity. Ausra's solar collectors employ mass-produced and thus cheaper flat mirrors, and they focus light onto tubes filled with water, thus directly producing steam.

Ausra's collectors produce less power, but that power costs less to produce.

One megawatt's worth of Ausra's solar collectors has been producing steam in New South Wales, Australia, since 2004; the steam is fed into the turbines of a primarily coal-fired power plant. The final piece of the system--a proprietary heat-energy-storage system--should be ready by 2009.

Mills will not say what material his company's system will heat, although several recent solar-thermal plants by Ausra competitors--including one in Nevada that started up this summer and two under construction in Spain near Granada--plan to use molten-salt storage. Molten salts are inexpensive salt solutions that absorb considerable energy when they melt and give up that energy when they freeze.

What Mills can say for certain is that Ausra's storage system will lower its power-generation costs. That is a surprising statement since energy storage can as much as double the cost of electricity from photovoltaics or wind turbines.

Heat storage is more efficient than electricity storage: just 2 to 7 percent of the energy is lost when heat is banked in a storage system, compared with losses of at least 15 percent when energy is stored in a battery. More important, says Mills, is the fact that storage enables thermal plants to use cheaper turbines.

The bottom line is that Mills vows that adding storage plus savings from economies of scale and lower cost of capital (as banks become familiar with solar-thermal technology) will cut Ausra's current 10 to 11 cents per kilowatt-hour cost of power in half. By 2010, he expects solar thermal to provide California with baseline power cheaper than natural gas, currently set by the state at 9.2 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Why has solar-thermal power received little attention from the energy-storage community despite such promise? John Boyes, manager of the Energy Storage & Distributed Energy Resources at Sandia National Laboratories, in Albuquerque, NM, says that solar thermal is viable but inflexible compared with other means of storing energy, such as, say, coupling wind farms to large batteries, flywheels, and supercapacitors that can be placed almost anywhere on a power grid. "You can store energy anywhere you have electricity and a little bit of floor space," says Boyes.

The footprint of Ausra's planned 175-megawatt plant will be, in contrast, about one square mile.

Solar Thermal Project, Mathania, Rajasthan

Serious Megawatts

India Building Large-Scale Solar Thermal Capacity

By Gordon Feller
October 2, 2002
Rajastan, India

Parabolic Trough Array
Brighton, Colorado, USA
photo: US D.O.E.

Editor's Note: Just as on a small scale, hybrid engines stretch a
gallon of gas, in the same manner a hybrid power plant can stretch its
own supply of fossil fuel. In India, a huge new power station using
hybrid systems is close to completing their financing and breaking
ground in the sunny state of Rajasthan. This fossil fuel / solar
hybrid will produce a whopping 140 megawatts of electric power, and 40
of those megawatts will be produced from a field of solar thermal
parabolic troughs. Not as glamorous as photovoltaics, but still much
more cost-effective, parabolic systems use mirrors to focus sunlight
that in turn heats a thermal media (gas, steam) to drive a turbine
generator. The project described below is projected to go in at about
US $1 million per megawatt, which is competitive with conventional
fuels. Read on...

India's power sector has a total installed capacity of approximately
102,000 MW of which 60% is coal-based, 25% hydro, and the balance gas
and nuclear-based. Power shortages are estimated at about 11% of total
energy and 15% of peak capacity requirements and are likely to
increase in the coming years. In the next 10 years, another 10,000 MW
of capacity is required. The bulk of capacity additions involve coal
thermal stations supplemented by hydroelectric plant development.
Coal-based power involve environmental concerns relating to emissions
of suspended particulate matter (SPM), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrous
oxide, carbon dioxide, methane and other gases. On the other hand,
large hydroplants can lead to soil degradation and erosion, loss of
forests, wildlife habitat and species diversity and most importantly,
the displacement of people. To promote environmentally sound energy
investments as well as help mitigate the acute shortfall in power
supply, the Government of India is promoting the accelerated
development of the country's renewable energy resources and has made
it a priority thrust area under India's National Environmental Action
Plan (NEAP).

The Indian government estimates that a potential of 50,000 MW of power
capacity can be harnessed from new and renewable energy sources but
due to relatively high development cost experienced in the past these
were not tapped as aggressively as conventional sources. Nevertheless,
development of alternate energy has been part of India's strategy for
expanding energy supply and meeting decentralized energy needs of the
rural sector. The program, considered one of the largest among
developing countries, is administered through India's Ministry of
Non-Conventional Energy Sources (MNES), energy development agencies in
the various States, and the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency
Limited (IREDA).

Parabolic Dish Array
Rajasthan, India
photo: UNESCO
Throughout the 1990's, India's private sector interest in renewable
energy increased due to several factors: (i) India opened the power
sector to private sector participation in 1991; (ii) tax incentives
are now offered to developers of renewable energy systems; (iii) there
has been a heightened awareness of the environmental benefits of
renewable energy relative to conventional forms and of the
short-gestation period for developing alternate energy schemes.
Recognizing the opportunities afforded by private sector
participation, the Indian Government revised its priorities in July
1993 by giving greater emphasis on promoting renewable energy
technologies for power generation. To date, over 1,500 MW of windfarm
capacity has been commissioned and about 1,423 MW capacity of small
hydro installed. The sector's contribution to energy supply has grown
from 0.4% of India's power capacity in 1995 to 3.4% by 2001.

India is located in the equatorial sun belt of the earth, thereby
receiving abundant radiant energy from the sun. The India
Meteorological Department maintains a nationwide network of radiation
stations which measure solar radiation and also the daily duration of
sunshine. In most parts of India, clear sunny weather is experienced
250 to 300 days a year. The annual global radiation varies from 1600
to 2200 kWh/sq.m. which is comparable with radiation received in the
tropical and sub-tropical regions. The equivalent energy potential is
about 6,000 million GWh of energy per year. The highest annual global
radiation is received in Rajasthan and northern Gujarat. In Rajasthan,
large areas of land are barren and sparsely populated, making these
areas suitable as locations for large central power stations based on
solar energy.

The main objectives of the project are these: (i) To demonstrate the
operational viability of parabolic trough solar thermal power
generation in India; (ii) support solar power technology development
to help lead to a reduction in production cost; and (iii) help reduce
greenhouse gas (GHG) global emissions in the longer term.
Specifically, operational viability will be demonstrated through
operation of a solar thermal plant with commercial power sales and
delivery arrangements with the grid. Technology development would be
supported through technical assistance and training. The project would
be pursued under The World Bank's Global Environment Fund (GEF) --
which has a leading program objective focused on climate change. This
project is envisaged as the first step of a long term program for
promoting solar thermal power in India that would lead to a phased
deployment of similar systems in the country and possibly in other
developing nations.

India supports development of both solar thermal and solar
photovoltaics (PV) power generation. To demonstrate and commercialize
solar thermal technology in India, MNES is promoting megawatt scale
projects such as the proposed 35MW solar thermal plant in Rajasthan
and is encouraging private sector projects by providing financial
assistance from the Ministry.

One of the prime objectives of the demonstration project is to ensure
capacity build-up through 'hands on' experience in the design,
operation and management of such projects under actual field
conditions. Involvement in the project of various players in the
energy sector, such as local industries, the private construction and
operations contractors, Rajasthan State Power Corporation Limited
(RSPCL), Rajasthan State Electricity Board (RSEB), Rajasthan Energy
Development Agency (REDA), Central Electricity Authority (CEA), MNES
and others, will help to increase the capacity and capability of local
technical expertise and further sustain the development of solar power
in India in the longer term.

The project's sustainability will depend on to what extent the impact
of the initial investment cost is mitigated, operating costs fully
recovered, professional management introduced, and infrastructure and
equipment support for operation and maintenance made accessible.
Accordingly, while the solar thermal station will be state-owned, it
will be operated during the initial five years under a management
contract with the private sector; subsidy support will be limited to
capital costs. Fuel input, power supply and other transactions would
be on a commercial basis and backed up by acceptable marketable
contracts. Staff selection and management would be based on business
practices; the project site would be situated where basic
infrastructure is well developed and engineering industries
established.

Parabolic Trough Array
Tehachapi, California, USA
photo: US D.O.E.
This project is consistent with the World Bank's Global Environment
Fund's operational strategy on climate change in support of long-term
mitigation measures. In particular, the project will help reduce the
costs of proven parabolic trough solar technology so as to enhance its
commercial viability. This initiative is part of an anticipated
multi-country solar thermal promotion program, the objectives of which
will be to accelerate the process of cost reduction and demonstrate
the technology in a wider range of climate and market conditions.

Demonstrating the solar plant's operational viability under Indian
conditions is expected to result in follow-up investments by the
private sector both in the manufacture of the solar field components
and in larger solar stations within India.

Insights into local design and operating factors such as
meteorological and grid conditions, and use of available back-up
fuels, are expected to lead to its replicability under Indian
conditions, opening up avenues for larger deployment of solar power
plants in India and other countries with limited access to cheap
competing fuels. Creation of demand for large scale production of
solar facilities will in turn lead to reductions in costs of equipment
supply and operation. It is also expected to revive and sustain the
interest of the international business and scientific community in
improving systems designs and operations of solar thermal plants.

The Project is expected to result in avoided annual emissions of
714,400 tons of CO2, or 17.9 million tons over the life of the
project, relative to generation from a similar-sized coal-fired power
station. The cost of carbon avoidance is estimated at $6.5 per ton.

The project involves: (i) Construction of a solar thermal/fossil-fuel
hybrid power plant of about 140MW incorporating a parabolic trough
solar thermal field of 35 MW to 40 MW; and (ii) Technical assistance
package to support technology development and commercialization
requirements.

Location of Rajasthan
Investment Component. The solar thermal/hybrid power station will
comprise: (i) a solar field with a collection area of 219,000 square
meters to support a 35MWe to 40MWe solar thermal plant; and (ii) a
power block based on mature fossil fuel technology (i.e, regasified
LNG). The proposed project will be sited at Mathania, near Jodhpur,
Rajasthan in an arid region. In addition to high solar insulation
levels (5.8 kWh/m2 daily average), the proposed site involves
approximately 800,000 square meters of relatively level land with
access to water resources and electric transmission facilities. The
solar thermal/hybrid station will operate as a base load plant with an
expected plant load factor of 80%. The final choice of the
fossil-fired power block would be left to the bidders, subject to
performance parameters set out in the tender specifications.

The design choice is an Integrated Solar Combined Cycle (ISCC)
involving the integrated operation of the parabolic trough solar plant
with a combined cycle gas turbine using naphtha. Such a plant would
consist of the solar field; a combined cycle power block involving two
gas turbines each connected to a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG)
and a steam turbine connected to both HRSG; and ancillary facilities
and plant services such as fire protection, regasified liquefied
natural gas supply and storage system, grid interconnection system,
water supply and treatment systems, etc. A control building will house
a central microprocessor control system that monitors and controls
plant operations.

The success of the solar thermal/hybrid power plant as a demonstration
project will determine if this technology is replicable in other parts
of India. The project will provide technical assistance to ensure that
adequate institutional and logistical support for the technology is
available for future expansion of solar thermal power.

Specifically, funds will be made available for promoting
commercialization of solar thermal technologies among potential
investors; staff training and development of a local consultancy base;
upgrading of test facilities; mproved collection and measurement of
solar insolation data and other solar resource mapping activities; and
development of pipeline investments.

The total cost of the investment component is estimated at US$ 201.5
million, including interest during construction, physical and price
contingencies as well as duties and taxes. Of these costs, the cost of
supplies (excluding contingencies) for the solar component including
the steam generator amounts to $41 million, and that for the
conventional power plant component is $72 million. The cost of the
technical assistance component for promoting replication of the solar
power technology is estimated at $4 million.

City Palace of Jaipur
Rajasthan, India

Investors Note: For more information on the solar thermal project in
Rajasthan, India, please contact:

Mr. G. L. Somani, General Manager
Rajasthan State Power Corporation Ltd.
E-166, Yudhisthar Marg, C-Scheme, Jaipur, India
Telephone No.: (91-141) 384055
Fax No.: (91-141) 382759

About the Author: Gordon Feller is the CEO of Urban Age Institute
(www.UrbanAge.org). During the past twenty years he has authored more
than 500 magazine articles, journal articles or newspaper articles on
the profound changes underway in politics, economics, and ecology -
with a special emphasis on sustainable development. Gordon is the
editor of Urban Age Magazine, a unique quarterly which serves as a
global resource and which was founded in 1990. He can be reached at
GordonFeller@UrbanAge.org and he is available for speaking to your
organization about the issues raised in this and his other numerous
articles published in EcoWorld.

Ausra plant deal with PG&E

Solar Startup Ausra Inks $1B Deal With PG&E

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on 05 November 2007, 18:49
by April Kilcrease

Pacific Gas and Electric on Monday announced that it signed a
177-megawatt solar thermal power purchasing agreement with Ausra.

According to John O'Donnell, Ausra's executive vice president, the
twenty-year agreement will generate over $1 billion in revenue for the
Palo Alto, California-based start-up.

The plant will be located in San Luis Obispo County, California, and
is expected to begin generating power in 2010. Ausra has filed its
application for certification for this plant with the California
Energy Commission, which must grant approval before construction
begins.

PG&E supplies 12 percent of its energy from renewable sources, said
Keely Wachs, PG&E's environmental communications manager.

"PG&E continues to aggressively add renewable electric power
resources" to its supply and the company is confident that it will
meet or exceed its 20 percent renewable energy goal by 2010, he said.

Proving that bigger isn't always better, the plant will use only one
square mile of land and will burn no fuel, use minimal water, and have
no air or water emissions.

Ausra's Compact Linear Fresnel Reflector (CLFR) solar technology
utilizes the heat from the sun's rays to create steam. Solar
collectors boil water at high temperatures to power steam turbine
generators.

Because Ausra's flat mirrors–called Fresnel reflectors–are never more
than eight feet off the ground, they cast shorter shadows that allow
them to be built close together. This means Ausra only needs 2-2.5
acres of land per megawatt compared with 5 acres per megawatt for
solar trough systems or 7 acres per megawatt for solar dish engine
systems, Mr. O'Donnell said.

Compared with other power purchase agreements in California in the
last few years, the new agreement with Ausra is among the smallest.

According to Mr. Wachs, PG&E's 553-megawatt power purchase agreement
with Solel-MSP-1, a subsidiary of Israel-based Solel Thermal Systems,
in July is the single largest solar commitment in the world right now.

PG&E has also entered an agreement with Oakland, California-based
BrightSource Energy for a 500-megawatt plan to be announced soon.

Although these agreements dwarf the deal with Ausra, New Energy
Finance analyst Nathaniel Bullard said that Ausra is well-positioned.

Other solar thermal energy projects such as Solel's Mojave Solar Park,
to be constructed in California's Mojave Desert, will be far away from
populated areas and the electric grid. Ausra's plant, to be located
about ten miles north of Carrizo Plain National Monument, may get less
sun than the Mojave Desert, but it will be directly under a PG&E
transmission line,  O'Donnell said.

Ausra's proposed plant will only need "850 feet to connect," said
Bullard. They'll be able to "tap right into the electric grid. It's a
lot less expensive and it speeds up the process."

The high cost of the feeder and trunk lines required to connect to the
grid from a long distance are often well outside of a smaller
developer's range.

By skirting the sometimes two-year-long Bureau of Land Management
review process and eschewing the burden of proof required to build on
public land, Ausra's decision to buy private land will also help speed
up the process.

"We're hoping to be the first to break ground," Mr. O'Donnell said.
The plant, which will be built on dried out former farm land, will be
"growing megawatts instead of wheat," he said.

Perhaps Ausra's plant will prove that when it comes to cost and speed,
size doesn't always matter in the race to solar thermal power.

Mongolian Solar Thermal Power Plant

Solar power plant under plan for Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region

By Mai Dou (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-06-03 08:37

Solar Millennium AG, a Germany-based solar energy technology company,
is working with its Chinese counterpart to build a
multi-billion-dollar solar power plant in North China.

The firm, with the Inner Mongolia Ruyi Industry Co Ltd, is conducting
a feasibility study for the project in Ordos of the northern Inner
Mongolia Autonomous Region.

Preparatory work will be completed for construction to begin by the
end of the year, said Christian Beltle, chairman of Solar Millennium.

When completed, the plant will be China's first large-scale commercial
plant converting sunlight into electricity, industry experts said.

The project, using solar-thermal technology provided by Solar
Millennium AG, would have a capacity of 1,000 MW (megawatts) by 2020.

Total investment would be about 20 billion yuan (US$2.5 billion),
according to the company.

An initial phase with a capacity of 50 MW would be built in "a short
period" at a cost of around 1.3 billion yuan (US$162.5 million), said
Wang Genshu, chairman of the Inner Mongolia Ruyi Industry Co Ltd.

Wang said they would invite strategic investors to come forward, both
domestic and foreign, when the National Development and Reform
Commission (NDRC) gives the go-ahead for the project, possibly next
year.

"About 20 to 30 per cent of the total spending will be financed by
investors, with the remaining coming from bank loans," Wang said.

He said a few companies, including foreign ones, have shown strong
interest in the solar project.

Officials from the country's top five power companies, including
Huaneng and Datang, were not available for comment.

The German energy firm signed a framework agreement with its Chinese
partner last month.

The move marks Solar Millennium's first entry into the growing
renewable market in China. It has clinched deals to build similar
plants in other places such as Spain and the United States.

"This is our pilot project in China; I consider this to be a
forward-looking decision based on sharply-increasing energy demand in
the country," said Beltle. "China is expected to become our largest
market in three to four years."

Analysts participating in the feasibility study said they had
investigated three provinces in China, but finally selected Ordos in
Inner Mongolia because of its water resources and abundant sunlight.

Solar-thermal technology, different from the more-commonly-used
photovoltaic cells that directly turn light into electricity, needs
water to generate steam for power production, and is cheaper in terms
of construction costs, experts said.

Ma Shenghong, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the
Ordos solar plant would sell its electricity for 1.5-1.6 yuan (18.8-20
US cents) per kilowatt-hour to the grid companies.

China, the world's second-biggest energy consumer after the United
States, is pushing the use of renewable energy sources such as wind
and solar to generate electricity. At the beginning of the year the
government passed the country's first law on renewable energies.

Beijing aims to increase renewable consumption in the energy mix from
the current 7 per cent to 15 per cent by 2020.

China's major power companies have been ordered to ensure 5 per cent
of their electricity generators are fuelled by renewable energy
sources by 2010, Zhang Guobao, vice-minister of the NDRC, the nation's
top economic planning body, has said.

Investor Khosla: Clean energy only matters when it meets 'China price'

Investor Khosla: Clean energy only matters when it meets 'China price'

Posted by Martin LaMonica | 2 comments

WASHINGTON--Famed venture capitalist Vinod Khosla told energy and
environmental ministers from around the world they greatly
underestimate how rapidly energy is moving toward renewable sources.

Khosla was a speaker during the ministerial plenary at the Washington
International Renewable Energy Conference (WIREC) 2008 here on
Tuesday, where he argued that the energy industry is undergoing a
technology disruption, much the way that telecom and computing did
decades ago.

Vinod Khosla argues that people underestimate the pace of technology
change in energy.
(Credit: Martin LaMonica/CNET Networks)

The reason people don't appreciate the pace of change is faulty
projections, he said. Government officials and businesspeople trust
market forecasts which have consistently been far off-base.

People believed that it would take decades for mobile phones to become
widespread, but it happened much quicker because they had mistakenly
assumed that the phones would remain the same as the original clunky
prototypes. McKinsey forecast that there would be less than 1 million
cell phones sold between 1980 and 2000, when the actual number was
more like 109 million.

"We are repeating the same mistakes in energy," Khosla said. "It's
hard for people to imagine what energy will look like in 10 or 15
years."

Because technology change happens faster than most people anticipate,
he believes that several renewable energy technologies will become
cost-competitive within five or ten years.

He forecast electricity production at the same price as fossil fuel
power plants, biofuels from non-food sources at $1 a gallon,
high-efficiency engines and lighting, and carbon neutral cement
production.

"All these technologies are in development today. Oil will have to be
$35 per gallon to compete," he said.

Underlying his assumptions, however, is a rapid adoption of these
energy technologies.

To achieve these cost efficiencies, new energy technologies have to
pass what Khosla calls the "Chindia test." That is, the need to be
cheap enough for China, India, and other developing countries to
purchase.

That scale will accelerate technology development and adoption, he
argued. Expensive products like plug-in hybrid cars, which may be the
darlings of environmentalists, simply won't drive large-scale change,
he said.

"Plug-in hybrids are irrelevant because they are too expensive. Unless
you can make 500 million or 800 million of those, it won't matter," he
said.

His contention that plug-in hybrids are irrelevant, or "toys," a case
he made late last year at a conference, brought fierce criticism from
environmentalists.

Although a longtime denizen of Silicon Valley, Khosla is no stranger
to Washington, D.C., where he has presented to congresspeople and
lobbied for supportive policies.

The U.S. government should boost investment in research and technology
and implement regulations that put a price on carbon emissions, he
said.

Clearly an optimist, Khosla ticked off a number of technologies he has
invested in that could shift the energy industry from fossil fuels,
including solar thermal power, cellulosic ethanol, advanced
geothermal, synthetic liquid fuels, and energy efficiency.

"We are mounting a war on oil, a war on coal, a war for efficiency and
renewable materials," he said.

Brightsource FAQs

THREE QUICK FACTS ABOUT BRIGHTSOURCE ENERGY'S SOLAR THERMAL POWER PLANTS

  1. The Ivanpah Solar Power Complex that BrightSource is building
near the California/Nevada border in the Mojave Desert will power
250,000 homes and reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by over
500,000 tons per year.

  2. BrightSource's 400MW Ivanpah Solar Power Complex will produce
more electricity in one year than the total of all of the residential
solar installations currently installed in the US. [Note: Ivanpah is
the only utility-scale solar project currently under development in
the US that has reached this advanced permitting stage.]

  3. If BrightSource Energy plants were built on less than 2% of the
land in the Mojave Desert, they would provide enough power for all of
the homes in California and reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by
over 30 million tons per year.


TEN FAQS ABOUT SOLAR THERMAL POWER
1. What is the difference between the terms "solar thermal power,"
"concentrating solar power," and "CSP"?

Solar thermal power is sometimes called concentrating solar power or
CSP.  These labels refer to technologies that use the energy of the
sun to produce steam, directly or indirectly.  The steam is then piped
to a convention power generation system to make electricity.  The
difference between a solar thermal plant and a conventional
fossil-fueled power plant is that conventional plants create steam by
burning fuels that release carbon into the atmosphere.

2. What is the difference between solar thermal power plants and
photovoltaic (also known as PV) systems?

Solar thermal power plants, often also called Concentrating Solar
Power (CSP) plants, use sunlight to produce steam, which is then used
to generate electricity.  By contrast, photovoltaic (also known as PV)
systems use special panels to collect sunlight and convert it directly
to electricity.  "Thermal" refers to the fact that it is the heat of
the sunlight that is used, and "concentrating" refers to the fact that
solar thermal systems concentrate the sunlight, in much the same way
that a magnifying glass does, to harness its heat.
Solar thermal plants are large utility-scale projects that generate
enough power to serve tens of thousands of homes.  Their power is
usually sold to public utilities, which then sell it to their
customers.  Photovoltaic systems are usually much smaller and are
usually installed on residences, schools, or office buildings.

3. Where can solar thermal plants be built?

In theory, a solar thermal plant can be built anywhere that the sun
shines, however cost considerations dictate that they be built in
areas of high solar radiation – a measure of how much power can be
generated in a single square meter of surface area in a typical year.
The best solar radiation is found in high desert areas, such as the
Mojave Desert in Southern California, where the sun shines reliably
330 to 350 days a year.  Another major consideration is that solar
plants need to be built in the vicinity of power transmission lines
serving markets large enough to use all of the power generated by the
plant.

4. How much land do solar thermal plants require?

The answer depends on two factors:  a) the solar insularity (see FAQ
3) of the plant location, and b) the specific technology being used.
In general, a typical 100 MW solar thermal plant will occupy 600 to
800 acres.  Installing solar power plants on an area covering only 1%
of the Mojave Desert would provide enough solar power to serve 75% of
the homes in California.

5. How much are atmospheric carbon emissions reduced by solar thermal
power plants?

Carbon emissions are reduced by 600 pounds for each MW hour of solar
power that displaces an equal amount of fossil-fuel power.  Installing
solar power plants on an area covering 1% of the Mojave Desert would
reduce annual carbon emissions by over 20 million tons.

6. Is solar thermal power reliable and available when needed most -
during peak demand hours?

The peak demand period for electricity is the hottest part of the day,
when air conditioners are running in offices and homes.  This is the
same time of day when solar power is produced.  In addition, because
sunshine is reliable and consistent in the desert areas where solar
power plants are typically built solar power is also consistent and
reliable. Conversely, another common form of renewable power
production, wind power, normally has its peak production period during
the nighttime hours, and is much less predictable and reliable.

7. Are there ways to use solar power to provide electricity power both
day and night?

Unlike the photovoltaic systems typically installed on rooftops, CSP
plants produce their electricity by first producing steam then using
that steam to generate electricity.  Thus, CSP plants can be fitted
with gas-fired boilers to produce steam when the sun is not shining,
enabling the plants to produce electricity at any time.  This provides
valuable back-up generation capacity to utility companies for use when
wind power is not available, or demand is unusually high. Another
method is to install thermal storage to store heat during the daylight
hours and release that heat during the night to make electricity.  At
this time, such storage systems are not economical, but it is
anticipated that the cost will come down and make the use of solar
power viable around-the-clock.

8. Will the cost of electricity produced by CSP plants vary in the future?

The cost of fuel represents about 60% of the cost of producing
electricity from fossil-fueled plants.  CSP plants require no fuel,
thus the cost of the power they produce is not affected by the
vagaries and risks associated with fossil fuel prices. Other than very
slight increases in maintenance and operating expenses due to
inflation, the cost of power produced by a CSP plant will not change
over its economic life.

9. How does the cost of electricity produced by CSP plants compare to
the cost of electricity produced by fossil fuel plants?

Solar thermal power is probably cheaper than power from fossil fuels
when all cost externalities are considered.  While many of the costs
of fossil fuels are well known, others (pollution related health
problems, environmental degradation, the impact on national security
from relying on foreign energy sources) are indirect and difficult to
calculate. These are traditionally external to the pricing system, and
are thus often referred to as externalities. In order to better
control this matter, legislative and regulatory bodies are moving to
require the sequestration of carbon to keep it out of the atmosphere,
or apply a corrective pricing mechanism, such as a carbon tax, to
fossil-fueled power plants.  Either measure will lead to the cost of
solar thermal power becoming cheaper to the consumer than fossil fuel
based energy.

Even without pricing cost externalities, the cost of solar thermal
power is going down.  As more plants are built and technologies
improve, this price should continuously drop over the next ten years
with the result that the price of solar power seems likely to be in
the same range as power from fossil fueled plants, even without carbon
emissions costs considered.

10. How does today's regulatory environment impact the development of
solar energy plants?

The combination of environmental concerns and persistently higher
prices for commodity fuels has caused a number of states to adopt
Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) that require their utilities to
purchase as much as 33% of their power from renewable energy sources
such as wind, hydro and solar by specified dates.  These and other
regulatory mandates including federal mandates and tax incentives
provide an environment conducive to the development of alternative
energy solutions and make the building of solar power plants cost
effective.

A favorable governmental and regulatory climate makes the delivery of
renewable energies possible.  And, these requirements, such as the RPS
in place for California that requires utilities to purchase 20% of its
power from renewable sources by 2011 and 33% by 2017, help to
encourage utilities to make the development of alternative energy
sources possible.






TEN FAQS ABOUT BRIGHTSOURCE ENERGY
1. What is BrightSource Energy Inc.?

BrightSource Energy, Inc. designs and builds large scale solar power
plants that can deliver low-cost solar energy in the form of steam and
or electricity to industrial and utility customers worldwide at prices
competitive with fossil fuels.  BrightSource Energy enables industrial
and utility customers to lessen their dependency on fossil fuels by
providing a cost effective clean source of power during periods of
peak usage.

2. When and where was BrightSource Energy founded?  By whom?

BrightSource Energy was founded as Luz II in 2004 by Arnold Goldman.
Mr. Goldman has been in the solar energy field for over twenty years
and was the founder and CEO of Luz International Ltd., which built
nine large solar power plants in the 1980s   In 2004 Mr. Goldman
reassembled a number of members of the original Luz International
executive and technical team and founded Luz II to develop a new solar
energy technology to take advantage of renewed interest in the use of
renewable energy to produce electricity and regulatory / legislative
support of such projects.

In 2006, the name of the company was changed from Luz II, Inc. to
BrightSource Energy, Inc.  The Luz II name was retained by
BrightSource's wholly owned subsidiary in Israel, which is responsible
for engineering and development, and the supply of solar fields for
BrightSource plants.

3. Where does BrightSource Energy's financing come from?

BrightSource Energy is a privately held company. Its principal
investors include: VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley,
Draper Fisher Jurvetson, J.P. Morgan, And Chevron Technology Ventures.

4. What was Luz International?  What are SEGS?

Luz International was the solar technology company that successfully
designed, built, financed, and operated nine solar energy plants in
Southern California between 1984 and 1991. Luz International remains
to this day, as the only company in the world to have built
large-scale commercial solar thermal projects – the 350 MW SEGS
projects in the Mojave Desert – which are still in operation today.

SEGS is the acronym for Solar Electricity Generating Stations, which
was the name given to the type of power plants built by Luz
International in the Mojave Desert in Southern California between 1984
and 1991.  Fifteen of the key members of the Luz International
engineering and commercial team that built those SEGS are now key
members of the BrightSource team.

5. How does a BrightSource Energy power plant work?

Unlike solar photovoltaic technologies, which convert sunlight
directly to electricity through silicon or other solid-state
materials, BrightSource Energy's solar thermal technology converts
sunlight to heat, in the form of steam or hot air that is then used to
drive a turbine to produce electricity.  The technology used by
BrightSource is called Distributed Power Tower, or DPT.

6. How does DPT work?

DPT™ stands for Distributed Power Tower and is a BrightSource design
based on the solar power tower concept proven by the DOE Solar I and
Solar II projects in the 1980s.  The innovations that BrightSource has
brought to the power tower design make it far less expensive to build
and more efficient in its production of electricity.

A DPT solar field, known as a Solar Power Cluster (SPC), consists of
an array of thousands of relatively small flat glass mirrors placed in
the desert and an associated power tower and receiver (solar boiler)
which converts the light received into useful heat.  These mirrors
reflect sunlight onto the collection surface of the solar boiler
approximately 300 feet in the air on top of a tower.  The concentrated
sunlight focused on the collection surface is used to directly heat
steam, which then drives a turbine/generator to produce electricity.

7. How does the BrightSource solar thermal solution compare to other
renewable energy resources and to other solar energy solutions?

A properly located and constructed solar power plant is a more
desirable source of power generation for utilities than other types of
renewable energy, such as wind plants, because solar plants produce
the greatest amount of power at the time when the demand on the
utility is greatest – sunny afternoons.  A BrightSource DPT plant has
a further advantage in that it can be fitted with auxiliary boilers,
which will enable them to reliably supply electricity to the grid
during both solar and non-solar hours, and during any extended period
of solar disruption.

8. Does this solution mean that photovoltaic systems make no sense?

Both photovoltaic systems and solar thermal systems have a role to
play.  Photovoltaic installations are well suited for individual
installations in residences and small commercial or industrial
facilities where they complement and supplement energy supplied by
public utilities.  By contrast, solar thermal installations are
designed to provide large quantities of power for direct sale to
public utilities to reduce the need for electricity produced by fossil
fuel power plants.
9. How does the cost of energy from a BrightSource Energy solar
thermal plant compare to the cost of electricity provided by a PV
system?

Solar thermal power, using BrightSource's DPT solar technology can be
produced for about half the cost of electricity produced by
photovoltaic systems, making solar thermal the lowest-cost form of
solar power yet available.  The economy of scale and lack of costly
specialized materials will allow BrightSource plants to achieve the
lowest cost of solar electricity in the world.

10. How does BrightSource Energy's approach differ from other solar
thermal solutions?  Is it better?  Is it more efficient?

BrightSource's DPT technology has several significant advantages over
other solar thermal technologies:  a) unlike most solar thermal
technologies, DPT plants produce steam directly from solar energy, b)
the steam has a much higher temperature (550° C vs 380° C), which
results in more efficient operation, c) the mirrors that reflect the
sunlight move in two dimensions to follow the sun during the day and
during the seasons (other technologies only move in one dimension), d)
the glass used in the mirrors is less expensive because it is flat,
not curved, and e) DPT solar fields can be installed on uneven or
sloping ground.

11. How does DPT technology differ from the technology used in the
original SEGS plants?

The solar fields for the SEGS plants built by Luz International
utilize long rows of curved glass mirrors to heat synthetic oil, which
is piped to a heat exchanger to produce steam at about 375° C.  This
steam is used to drive a steam turbine to produce electricity.  By
contrast, the DPT 550 technology uses thousands of small flat glass
mirrors (known as heliostats) to focus sunlight on a solar boiler
located on top of a tower.  The sunlight heats steam directly to a
temperature of about 550° C and the steam is used to drive a steam
turbine to produce electricity.