Mojave Desert – Largest Solar Power Installation in the World

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.

Home Solar Power Systems – Are they easy to build?

There has been a lot of talk about home solar power systems from as the past couple of decades especially after all the growth and development that the solar energy area has been undergoing in the past decade or so. Further, immense advancements in technology has further made it possible for home owners and scientists to look at from a commercial and practical point of view and consider it as a serious competitor for other traditional energy sources. Also, solar energy has also taken big strides in the renewable sources of energy field and is way ahead of other renewable sources of energy when it comes to converting natural sources into useful energy such as electricity. The thing about electricity and the reason why many scientists get excited over converting renewable sources of energy is that it is very versatile and flexible. What I mean to say is that electricity can be converted to almost any other form of energy that we practically use in our day to day life. This is also one of the other solar energy advantages as it makes sure that all the solar energy is being efficiently converted into electrical energy. The other advantage with electricity is that it is efficient. In fact, that is one of its single highest advantages. Because it is efficient, the energy can be used in almost every way without losing a lot of energy. Anyway, now lets move back to the original topic of home solar power systems and look at the options that a prospective buyer has of getting one or buying one or installing everything by himself in his house.



I digressed a bit from the main point that I was going to talk about. This can happen to me from time to time and you may have noticed it if you have been reading the posts in my blog for quite a long time. Anyway, once again, getting back to "home solar power systems"...


Let's look at some of the advantages of home solar power. As each day and each month passes, many governments across the world are realizing the various advantages that generating useful energy out of solar energy has to both the people in the respective countries and to themselves as a huge money saver. Even the private sector is getting very actively involved and is viewing it as a huge money making opportunity. Any time that the private sector gets involved so actively, you know that there are profits involved. Also, with today's energy crisis turning out to be pretty bad, it does not come as a surprise that solar energy and other renewable sources of energy are being looked upon as possible solutions to this problem. Of course, fossil fuels need not be mentioned as being sources of pollution and being perfectly capable of harming the environment and our planet. Here's a fact if you have not heard about it before. Every hour, if all the energy that the earth receives is effectively used, then it will be enough to meet the energy needs of the whole population of the earth for an entire year. For those wanting facts, every day, one square feet of area on the earth receives as much as a thousand watts of energy. Photovoltaic cells or PV's or solar cells as they are known can be used in a large scale to convert this solar energy to electricity. The Mojave Desert is one of the perfect examples of the ways this energy can be used. It is located in California and meets the energy needs of 500,000 people by using solar energy.



Solar panels are basically made up a lot of solar cells and are designed to generate electrical energy from solar energy and are basically made up of a lot of individual solar cells or photovoltaic cells are they are also called. Ideally, they would have to be placed at places where the sun shines all day. Also, it would be even better if it could somehow be made sure that it is angled in such a way that when the sun is the brightest or the most intense, the solar panel receives all of the sun's rays in an efficient manner. As I had described before in one of my previous posts about the working of photovoltaic cells, silicon receives these rays and there are two plates of silicon-phosphorus and phosophorus-born which make sure that the electricity is conducted with a smooth flow of electrons. You have to make sure that you need other essential equipment such as charge controllers preferable around 6 amps and battery tanks to store power. The solar panel is built in such a way that this energy is stored properly when there is excess electrical energy generated.


The best part about home solar power systems is that if you happen to make extra power with the help of your solar panel, you can sell that power to your local utility company for money. This is also called as "net metering" and is basically the process where in government recognize people who generate their own power and seek to reward them by offering various financial incentives and tax incentives. You would have to pay lesser money in taxes than most other people. In "net metering" basically what happens is that your electric meter runs back and forth depending on how much extra energy or power you have generated.


Regarding the costs, the main factor that you would have to be worried about with home solar power systems is that the initial costs can be quite formidable. But it helps if you consult professionals such as solar professionals or professionals from your utility company to see if your house is fit to be used for generating power with solar energy. But, rest assured that you will definitely recover any costs that you may have gone through initially, in the long run when the home solar power system starts churning out some serious power for you sitting on the rooftop of your house.


To a greener future,


Andy.