I am all for alt.energy when there is no other option but to try to use it to replace baseline generation is just plain stupid.
From Forbes:
Thermal Solar Energy -- Some Technologies Really Are Dumb
The largest solar energy facility in the world is already irrelevant and has cost a lot more to construct than any other form of energy. The Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System is a 5-square-mile, 392 MW array that cost $2.2 billion. It is located in the Mojave Desert, where the Sun always shines, and is supposed to produce a billion kWhs per year for 25 years.
But there’s a problem – the Sun does not seem to be cooperating. A spokesman for NRG Energy blamed the weather, saying the Sun didn’t perform as predicted.
Instead of a billion kWhs of electricity, this year Ivanpah will produce less than 0.4 billion kWhrs, making its capacity factor only 12%, not the 30% advertised. And certainly not the 90% of base load generators like nuclear power.
The author mentions the little bird 'problem'
To its credit, Ivanpah has shown us what the issues are with this technology. It is extremely expensive to build and doesn’t produce much energy for that cost. Its efficiency is less than expected, and it kills birds in a way that no one anticipated.
From a distance, birds see the mirrors as water and, in a desert, that will always attract them. As they approach the array, birds get torched in the 800° F solar beams. A recent study released by the California Energy Commission called Ivanpah a “mega-trap” that will kill tens of thousands of birds a year.
And they run the numbers:
At this level of operation, over 20 Ivanpahs (at a cost of $50 billion) would be needed to produce the 9 billion kWhs that a single nuclear reactor produced last year. 40 Ivanpahs, costing about $85 billion and having triple the carbon footprint, are needed to replace the loss of the two reactors at California’s San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
Not looking good for alt.energy these days - even windmill proponents are starting to wake up...
