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Saturday, May 14th, 2016

‘Tantalisingly close’: is solar thermal energy ready to replace coal-fired power?

Author:     David Sparkes
Source:     The Guardian (U.K.)
Publication Date:     Thursday 12 May 2016 20.09 EDT
 Link: ‘Tantalisingly close’: is solar thermal energy ready to replace coal-fired power?
Stephan:   Here is some good news about the transition out of the carbon age. There are so many developments in so many areas of alternative energy production that one can only wonder: if we had made the commitment to exit the carbon era in 1973 when we had the first oil crisis, what would we look like today, and what impact would that have had on climate change.
Solar Reserve’s 110MW Crescent Dune plant in Nevada, US, will be a blueprint for its planned solar thermal plant in Port Augusta, South Australia. Credit: SolarReserve

Solar Reserve’s 110MW Crescent Dune plant in Nevada, US, will be a blueprint for its planned solar thermal plant in Port Augusta, South Australia.
Credit: SolarReserve

Companies working on large-scale solar thermal projects in Australia say they are tantalisingly close to achieving the dream of building plants big enough to replace coal-fired energy in Australia.

Experts speaking at the Australian Solar Energy Exhibition and Conference in Melbourne last week said the technology had been proven in other countries, and projects in Australia were viable, but the challenge was getting major investors to gamble on something new.

James Fisher, the chief technology officer of Australian solar energy company Vast Solar, said solar thermal energy had been the “poor cousin” to photovoltaic solar panels for some years, but that may finally be changing.

“We’ve got a whole lot of coal-fired power stations that largely are 30-plus years old and many of […]

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1 Comment

  1. Damien McLeod on Saturday, May 14, 2016 at 9:26 am

    Thank you Mr. Schwartz for drawing my attention to this article, I forward it to several of my friends.