The project "Ivanpah": Giants or invest in renewable energy Bashny.Net

In recent years, more and more, so-called renewable energy sources (RES). Such methods for humanity is nothing new. All we know about alternative energy sources such as wind, solar, tides, and so on. And if once said about renewable energy, as something new and unusual, but now these sources of energy are investing more and more large companies.





Undoubtedly, the biggest advantage of this energy is its inexhaustibility, hence the term "renewable". This allows large companies to save millions of dollars. Also, many experts cite environmental friendliness of such projects, but it is as yet not completely clear.

So, for example, Apple has a station on the development of solar energy an area of ​​400 sq. M. m. And Google has posted thousands of wind turbines in Iowa to use wind energy for its data center. In addition to these companies, there are still dozens of other giants who practice RES, including: Microsoft, Duke Energy, Intel, Ikea, FedEx ...



But let's not beat around the bush. Today we talk about the largest solar power plant, the legendary project "Ivanpah." The station is located near the famous Las Vegas in the Mojave Desert, where the sun can provide tremendous energy production. In the theory of "solar farm", the full name is «Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System», able to provide electricity to a large city.



The object has an area of ​​14 square kilometers and includes 173,000 heliostats and three units in the form of towers in height of 137 meters. The station is capable of producing a whopping 392 MW of solar energy. In comparison, in the second place in the lead up to this station in Abu Dhabi 100 MW. According to many experts, "Ivanpah" is a real breakthrough in the world of solar energy. For the construction of the station has been spent $ 2 billion. The construction lasted more than three years efforts 2700 experts. The project was officially put into operation in February 2014.

How it all began h4> The history of the project "Ivanpah" originated back in 2004. Initially, the idea has positioned itself as a start-known company BrightSource Energy. To implement the project, the company began to look for investors and they soon found. Among them were DBL, Morgan Stanley, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, BP and others. In total, investors have allocated $ 100 million. Later, the number of investors joined Google, he singled out a project no less than $ 168 million. But to implement such a large-scale project of the funds, of course, was not enough and BrightSource Energy decides to ask for help from the US state. As a result, the US federal government under the pretext of helping in the development of innovative projects invested $ 1, 6 billion loan funds.

On the way to the implementation of the "Ivanpah" there were many obstacles, such as the economic crisis and the downturn in the demand for eco-friendly energy, but that did not stop BrightSource go to his purpose. In 2010 construction began on the "solar station". And so, when the project is completely finished, we can observe a work of art.

How it works h4>

Despite the apparent complexity, the principle of operation of the solar farm is quite simple. As already stated above, the station consists of 173 thousand heliostats. Heliostat - a device that regardless of the daily movement of the sun is able to rotate the mirror that directs the rays of the sun in the same direction. Each heliostat consists of a pair of mirrors and control mechanism.



In the center of each of the heliostats field is three-tower power plants. The mirrors focus sunlight on a boiler atop a tower. From the heating boiler to 538 ° C steam is generated, which is supplied to the turbine with an electric generator.



When boiler overheating the surface becomes white, reflecting the excess energy. At the bottom of the tower is a cooling system. Each tower is also dispatching a graphical control system of all elements of the station.

Ecological Station was not quite the environmental h4> Given that the majority, calling the advantages of solar energy, primarily refer to its environmental friendliness, is not likely to know the whole truth. Firstly, most environmentalists are concerned about the nature of the damage caused in the field of construction. Secondly, due to the ingress of concentrated sunlight killed thousands of birds, some of which are rare species.

The future of the station and solar energy as a whole h4> In spite of all, the project "Ivanpah" not ideal, and that a sufficient number of reasons. Implementation of the project has taken a long time and was very financially costly. But the most ironic that the technology of solar station, according to many experts, managed to become obsolete. This is due primarily to the presence of wireline control station. For example, in many European geliostantsiyah several years are used for GSM-communication signals. Plus the station has not used the accumulated energy storage that now is a more effective method. But, nevertheless, "Ivanpah" is currently the largest and most powerful geliostantsiey world.

According to forecasts by 2020 the share of solar energy in the world market will be more than 10%, which certainly proves the potential of renewable energy sources.



Source: geektimes.ru/company/ua-hosting/blog/243793/