The construction of the world's largest thermal solar power

Yes, really good news: finally completed the construction (and related tests) solar power plant in the Mojave Desert. This station is the largest in the world, its area - 14 to 24 square kilometers (5, 5 square miles). The name of this object - Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System. This station is a type of thermal solar power.

This station is capable of producing about 30% of the "thermal energy" produced in the United States. At the facility has 3 towers in the 140 meters, surrounded by 300,000 mirrors the size of a garage door. These mirrors focus the sunlight on a collector located in the upper part of the tower. In the upper part of the tower is located, and the water tank, where, and sent all the thermal energy collected mirrors.

For each tower was built and its control center, plus there is a common control center, where the controlled operation of the entire system. At the same time, according to the company, to create a station in a no repository for molten salt coolant , as in the case of smaller projects, such as Crescent Dunes .

It is worth noting that each of the mirrors can be tilted and a direction of inclination of the command center. Biweekly mirror washed. It is understood that the special system of mirrors washing + special team cleaners, cleaning mirrors at night. To manage all the mirrors was created proprietary system SFINCS (Solar Field Integrated Control System).

The entire system consists of 22 million individual parts (rivets, bolts, etc. are not considered).

The total cost of the project amounted to 2, $ 2 billion, of which 1, 4 - a federal loan.

In this case, the system produced steam turbine blades directed at producing energy, which is enough for the needs of 140,000 households in California.

However, it was not without problems. For example, focused the sun's rays burn the birds flying over the station. This fact is the reason for the protests of environmental organizations in the US. But, despite all the protests, the project was able to complete and start to work.