Solar-Driven Parabolic Dish Farm Opens

Solar plant developer Tessera Solar installed 60 solar collectors, called the SunCatcher from Stirling Energy Systems, in Peoria, Ariz. Each dish is rated at 25 kilowatts and the entire facility will have a capacity of 1.5-megawatts of generation.

Utilities installing large-scale solar power generation are typically using arrays of flat photovoltaic panels or concentrating solar power systems, where mirrors or reflective troughs create heat to make electricity.

The Stirling Energy Systems technology also captures heat by using a mirrored parabolic dish that moves to track the sun. But instead of heating a liquid to make steam for a turbine, the heat is directed at a hydrogen gas-filled piston, which drives a Stirling engine to make electricity (click here to see how).

The company claims its technology delivers electricity more efficiently and uses less water than other technologies. Inifinia is another company that has built a solar-powered Stirling engine using a parabolic dish, although it is smaller.

Tessera Solar said that it has contracts to install as much as 1,600 megawatts’ worth of capacity in California and Texas.

US Military Installs 500 MW Solar Plant

The U.S. military is tackling a new mission in the field of alternative energy, moving to power up a 500-megawatt solar facility at Fort Irwin’s sprawling desert complex in California. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers launched its first phase of the project on October 15th, 2009. The project, located at the Army’s largest training range in California’s Mojave Desert, could grow as large as 1 GW in the future.

The companies will finance and build the plant in exchange for leasing of the military land. The project, planned for five sites over 13 years, could cost as much as $2 billion.

The solar power plant is part of the Army’s goal to meet a federal mandate stipulating a 25% renewable energy portfolio for all US government arms by 2025. This new facility at Fort Irwin will surpass the 14-MW solar plant at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada as the U.S. Department of Defense’s largest solar power plant. The new solar plant will utilize both concentrated solar and photovoltaic cell innovation taking advantage of solar thermal’s low-cost and photovoltaic solar’s fast installation.