Solar power plants in the Mojave Desert Totally Explained

Everything about Solar Power Plants In The Mojave Desert totally explained

There are several solar power plants in the Mojave Desert which supply power to the electricity grid. Solar Energy Generating Systems (SEGS) is the name given to nine solar power plants in the Mojave Desert which were built in the 1980s. These plants have a combined capacity of 354 megawatts (MW) making them the largest solar power installation in the world. There are also plans to build other large solar plants in the Mojave Desert. The Mojave Solar Park will deliver 553 MW of solar thermal power when fully operational in 2011. Insolation (solar radiation) in the Mojave Desert is among the best available in the United States, and some significant population centers are located in the area. This makes the Mojave Desert particularly suitable for solar power plants. These plants can generally be built in a few years because solar plants are built almost entirely with modular, readily available materials. Unlike traditional power plants, solar power stations provide an environmentally benign source of energy, produce virtually no emissions, and consume no fuel other than sunlight.

Solar One and Solar Two

Solar power towers use thousands of individual sun-tracking mirrors (called heliostats) to reflect solar energy onto a central receiver located on top of a tall tower. The receiver collects the sun's heat in a heat-transfer fluid that flows through the receiver. The U.S. Department of Energy, and a consortium of U.S. utilities and industry, built the first two large-scale, demonstration solar power towers in the desert near Barstow, CA.
Solar Two was decommissioned in 1999, and was converted by the University of California, Davis, into an Air Cherenkov Telescope in 2001, measuring gamma rays hitting the atmosphere.

Solar Electricity Generating Systems

Trough systems predominate among today's commercial solar power plants. Nine trough power plants, called Solar Energy Generating Systems (SEGS), were built in the 1980s in the Mojave Desert near Barstow. These plants have a combined capacity of 354 MW making them the largest solar power installation in the world. Today they generate enough electricity to meet the power needs of approximately 500,000 people.
Trough systems convert the heat from the sun into electricity. Because of their parabolical shape, trough collectors can focus the sun at 30-60 times its normal intensity on a receiver pipe located along the focal line of the trough. Synthetic oil circulates through the pipe and captures this heat, reaching temperatures of 390 °C (735 °F). The hot oil is pumped to a generating station and routed through a heat exchanger to produce steam. Finally, electricity is produced in a conventional steam turbine.
The cost of Nevada Solar One is in the range of $220-250 million. The power produced is slightly more expensive than wind power, but less than photovoltaic (PV) power.

Nellis Solar Power Plant

In December 2007, the U.S. Air Force announced the completion of a solar photovoltaic (PV) system at Nellis Air Force Base in Clark County, NV. Occupying of land leased from the Air Force at the western edge of the base, this ground-mounted photovoltaic system employs an advanced sun tracking system, designed and deployed by PowerLight subsidiary of SunPower. Tilted toward the south, each set of solar panels rotates around a central bar to track the sun from east to west. The 14-megawatt (MW) system will generate more than 30 million kilowatt-hours of electricity each year and supply approximately 25 percent of the total power used at the base. The Nellis Solar Power Plant is the largest solar photovoltaic system in North America.

Mojave Solar Park

Solel has signed a contract with Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) to build the world's largest solar plant in the Mojave Desert. When fully operational in 2011, the Mojave Solar Park will deliver 553 megawatts of solar power, the equivalent of powering 400,000 homes, to PG&E’s customers in northern and central California. The plant will cover up to of land. This will be the first commercial application of the Stirling Solar Dish which concentrates solar energy by the use of reflective surfaces and uses a Stirling heat engine to convert the heat into electricity.

Land use issues

Solar thermal power plants are large and seem to use a lot of land, but when looking at electricity output versus total size, they use less land than hydroelectric dams (including the size of the lake behind the dam) or coal plants (including the amount of land required for mining and excavation of the coal). While all power plants require land and have an environmental impact, the best locations for solar power plants are deserts or other land for which there might be few other human uses.Further Information

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