Since we have been talking about various solar energy advantages, I thought I would give you a detailed summary about some of the largest solar power installations in the world and how they generate a lot of electricity that is enough to support entire cities. Mojave Desert, which is located in certain parts of southeastern California and smaller parts of central California, southern Nevada, south western Utah and North western Arizona gets its name after Mohave tribe of native Americans. It is best known because of the large number of solar power plants which generates collectively over 354 megawatts (MW). There are several power plants in the Mojave Desert built from as long back as the 80's. According to Wikipedia, there are currently about nine solar power plants in the Desert. These power plants are also called as SEGS which stands for Solar Energy Generation Systems. The federal government of the United States plans to build more solar power plants in the desert among which is the Nevada Solar One solar plant which is expected to have a capacity of 64 MW. Mojave desert is one of the most ideal places for solar power generation as the solar radiation at this desert is among one of the best that is available in the US.
The south western part of the US receives some of the best amounts of solar radiation in the whole world and hence it is considered to be an ideal location for setting up power plants. It is said that the Mojave Desert receives up to twice the sunlight than other regions of the country. Therefore it is naturally an attractive place for setting up renewable sources of energy such as the solar plant which unlike non renewable sources or traditional sources of energy do not burn and pollute the air and consume only sunlight which is abundantly available unlike other fuels.
There are many incalculable factors when it comes to estimating the uses and benefits of fossil fuels. While the advantages are obvious (can be used to drive cars, and other automobiles), there are other factors such as pollution related health problems, degradation of the environment etc. that cannot be calculated exactly and is therefore, one cannot truly estimate the costs involved when it comes to non- renewable sources of energy. Also coming into the picture is factors related to buying fuel from other countries which can also turn out to be quite expensive. However, this is different with renewable sources of energy, especially solar energy because of the materials that are required to build set up this installation. This is because you are mainly using readily available materials that are available easily. This is indeed a big solar energy advantage.
Solar power towers typically use several tracking mirrors that are positioned at different angles to try and catch the sun's rays from practically any location in the sky it is at. These tracking mirrors are also called as heliostats. An example of such solar power towers is the solar one and solar two. They have the capacity to produce as much as 10 MW of power. One characteristic feature of the Solar Two was that it used molten salt to capture the son's energy and power. The hot salt could be used whenever needed to generate electricity. Astonishingly, it operated through clouds and even throughout the night. Solar two was later used as a telescope by the Californian Government.
Solar Energy Generation Systems (SEGS) – I told you about these earlier. These are the systems that are used primarily in the Mojave Desert. Here's some details regarding what they are used for and the future prospects for these systems. These SEG's were built by a company called as the Liz Industries which hails from Israel and were built in the 1980's. They generate a staggering 350 MW of power and are today used to meet the electricity needs of more than a staggering 500,000 people.
Trough Systems are normally parabolical in shape and this enables them to focus the sun's rays onto the grid or the panel at roughly 60 times the initial intensity of the sun. Now that is one place where you would not want to be standing at as that is an incredible amount of heat. These systems also have another unique feature. They use synthetic oil instead of the normally used water for circulating around the pipes inside the solar panels. This reaches temperatures of almost 750 F and is very hot once it comes out from the pipes. The hot oil is then sent to a generator or a generating station where an exchanger is typically used to convert it into electricity which is produced at the end by using the conventional steam turbines.
The Nellis Solar Power Plant, the Ivanpah Solar Power Facility and the Nevada Solar One are some of the very well known upcoming projects that is being considered by the Us Department of Energy. So now that you have learnt about some of the biggest solar energy advantages which is being utilized on a large scale all over the world. Many countries across the world are starting to utilize the solar energy to produce electricity on a large scale these days. In fact, it is vital that fast developing countries such as India and China make use of renewable sources of energy as they are going to become one of the biggest emitters of carbon di oxide, carbon mono oxide, sulphur di oxide and other similar harmful gases in the future. This could even facilitate the forming of really big holes in the ozone layer as well. This can be a big problem for humanity.
Make use of the solar energy advantages now and build a solar power system in your house immediately to start saving thousands of dollars in the future. Avail of various tax incentives offered by the government and save even more money.
To a greener future,
Andy.
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