alt.energy - the real price

Some sobering facts about a major alt.energy installation. From Benjamin Zycher writing at The American:

California’s New Solar Plant: Burning Up Taxpayer Money, Land, and Wildlife
The Ivanpah capital cost is $2.2 billion for 392 megawatts (MW) of gross generation capacity (potential power output per hour). (That 392 MW is a number not comparable to 392 MW of, say, gas-fired capacity, because of a sharply lower “capacity factor,” discussed below.) Accordingly, the nominal capital cost per kilowatt (kW, one one-thousandth of a MW) of capacity for Ivanpah is about $5600, a figure that ignores some costs that are important but hidden.

In comparison, the Energy Information Administration publishes estimates of the capacity costs per kW for coal, combined-cycle natural gas, nuclear, and on-shore wind capacity: respectively about $2700, $885, $4800, and $2075. For solar thermal plants in general, the EIA estimate is about $4750. (Bear in mind that these figures are for capacity costs only; they exclude fuel, operations and maintenance, and other costs.) The per-kW capacity cost of Ivanpah is well over twice that of wind power, which cannot compete economically without the federal production tax credit, guaranteed market shares, and other subsidies.

A lot more at the site -- this is a well written article and really shows how out of touch the alt-energy people really are. The plant is an environmental disaster located in a very fragile environment and the cost of the electricity it generates is among the highest of any technology.

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This page contains a single entry by DaveH published on May 23, 2014 2:50 PM.

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