Spain has become a center of solar installations
I somehow missed this, but as is clear from the data we dug up, this is a fairly recent development. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
There's a lot of CSP going up in the Mojave desert in california too. Expect both CSP and concentrated photovoltaics to explode onto the scene in 2009-11. We project that both will be cheaper than traditional PV sooner rather than later.
I note both the Mojave desert and most Spanish projects use the technology of four German companies: Flabeg (producer of the parabolic mirrors), Schott (manufacturer of the receivers), NOVATEC BioSol (complete supplier of Fresnel lens technology plants) and Solar Millennium (project developer). *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
Having said that, although you're right about the funding for CSP, the sheer size of a lot of these plants (at least 25 in the 50-500MW region scheduled to be up in the next two-three years) means that they will become a major share of the renewable market a lot quicker than PV or Wind did, which started with farms of a few MW. The economies of scale for a CSP farm make it a good investment for large utility companies. Water supply and grid connection to suitable desert regions are probably the biggest concerns.
Abengoa have 280MW planned in Arizona 'Solana' as well as the Solucar platform in spain which has 12MW in operation, 120MW being built and 170MW in development.
100MW is being developed by BrightSource Energy in Ivanpah, California due to commence operations in 2011, with deals for another 800MW in the future.
The European Solar Thermal Electricity Association is projecting 30GW of european CSP by 2020, not including any EU-led North African projects pumped in by high voltage wires.
There's a lot more out there too, Ausra and Solar Millenium
Due to the feed-in tariffs, Spain is the biggest market for CSP but California's tariffs are triggering a lot of investment in the Mojave desert. Solar Millenium estimates 800MW a year in California alone from 2008 onward.
If you can build 200MW of power in one installation versus 200MW over 5 or 10 installations of PV or wind, the investment industry will look more favourably on giving you the money.
That's an argument to change the rules for the investment industry, not against microgeneration. The point, again, is power: once the large semi-monopolists are back in power on the market, they will again aim at stiffling the 'competition', not at expanding renewables. (This is one of the reasons feed-in tariffs work better than certificates; and that most - but not all - existing quasi-monopolist utilities make little use of, and fight feed-in tariffs tooth-and-nails.) So in the end, I am okay with large utilities taking part in renewables development, but the rules of the game should be set up so that there is a de-facto clear priority for new players entering the 'market'. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
My priority is getting the number of megawatts supplying electricity renewably up as fast and effectively as possible. Every possible tech and scale is needed.
So the four developers look to have fixed contracts for about 2000 MW, with more vague commitments for thousands more. And I note I also saw that SCHOTT (the maker of receivers) wants to run up production to an impressive 1 GW/year.
That's more than I thought. But say 30 GW of CSP in the EU by 2020 is not beyond the scale of growth shown by wind and PV. (Wind achieved it by 2003, about 10 years after the start of 100-MW-scale growths in EU countries, and wind has a much higher capacity factor; PV is still only around 5 MW in the EU, with rapid growth from around 2003, but at the present rate of growth, 30 MW by 2013 doesn't look unlikely.)
But anyway, hopefully, solar thermal is now going to be the third renewable to mature in the electricity sector. I hope (dry-rock) geothermal will follow soon. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
http://www.nrel.gov/analysis/power_databook/docs/pdf/db_chapter02_csp.pdf
