Solar Thermal Mirrors And The Largest Solar Project

Renewable energy source is gaining more importance than the conventional power sources. The world’s largest solar project is now coming at the desert of Los Angeles that can produce more energy than larger nuclear plants.

This plant when completed will produce 1.3 Gig watts of power beating out China’s 1 GW PV plant that was announced to open this December. The plant is a joint venture of Southern California Edison, which serves the locals and Brightsource, the company who will be constructing the power plant.

The power will be generated by focusing light from the area with mirrors onto a tower. Then heat produced by the tower is used to boil water and the steam will turn a turbine, similar to a traditional coal and nuclear power plant.

This project is built with "Solar thermal Mirror" rather than photovoltaic power because it costs cheaper and is simpler to install than the photovoltaic cells. The Solar thermal mirrors have proved to have longer life span. The projects consist of seven towers that can produce 100 to 300 megawatts of electricity. The first one will be 2013 and other tower will be opened later.

Source Courtesy: Ecogeek.org