CONCENTRATED SOLAR POWER
Global attention in terms of energy security is focused on the political manoeuvres and unreliability of Russia as a gas and oil supplier. It is bizarre that so little attention is being paid to CSP, a simple parabolic mirror-based technology that is capable of replacing them as well as nuclear as long as the sun rises and that will be up and running long after gas, oil and uranium will have run out.
In the light of the mounting concern about global climate change and energy security, developed world countries and their leaders such as Bush, Blair and Putin have been promoting nuclear power as a major solution. Yet nuclear power only supplies 3.1% of global energy consumption and would be hard pushed to generate more due to the finite availability of accessible uranium fuel. CSP power stations located in just a few percent of the worlds hot deserts, with sufficient investment, could generate all forecast 2050 global energy consumption and phase out nuclear.
The basic technology is extremely simple. The Ancient Greeks used it to try to set fire to enemy warships. CSP uses parabolic mirrors to concentrate the suns heat (not to be confused with PV Photovoltaic which uses the suns light to generate electricity). It is quite possible using even a small parabolic reflector to have a point at the centre hot enough to melt metal.
In the wake of Iran’s nuclear ambitions many countries with or near hot deserts such as Algeria, Egypt, Namibia, Turkey and Tunisia have all expressed an interest in developing civil nuclear power.
To generate all the world’s electricity by nuclear power we would have to increase it by a factor of 10. The uranium problem can be solved by moving to fast-breeder reactors, a technology that’s not proven and inherently unsafe as its uses plutonium, but for about the same cost you could generate the same amount of electricity by CSP which has the benefits of a tried and tested safe and non-dependence on high-technology for the same price and same delivery.
Bush and Blair have shown no interest in promoting a strategy for using CSP for energy and climate security, despite evidence that the resource was huge and the technology could deliver energy cost effectively. In 2000, on being elected the Bush Administration requested the termination of CSP, despite the success of established CSP power stations for the last 15 years.
The National Academy of Sciences, coerced by the US Department of Energy, re-evaluated the concentrated solar technologies. The re-evaluation was forced after an earlier negative report issued by the Academy which had no verifiable industry input. Under the watchful eye of the DoE, the Academy contracted independent utility power engineering and analysis firm Sargent and Lundy to review the technologies. The report, issued in 2003, showed concentrated solar to be viable with attainable costs of 4–6 cents (US) per kWh for solar troughs. A 26,000 km2 farm in southwestern US could provide as much electricity as is needed to power the entire country.
CSP works best in hot desert. There are hot deserts within 3,000 miles of 90% of the worlds population e.g. North and South America, North and South Africa, Australia, India, Middle East etc.
This is the CSP power station at Kramer Junction, California (satellite image), that has been up and running for 20 years. New power stations are being built in the U.S. projected to be able to deliver electricity at 2.5p per kwh, which is half the price of nuclear. Nuclear is projected to cost 5p/kwhr but probably coming in closer to 8p. Unlike nuclear, which can only survive with huge public subsidy, CSP has the capability of unsubsidised competitiveness and unlike nuclear, it is carbon-free, clean and safe. It uses solar energy, which is free, renewable and infinite in supply. CSP has none of the unresolved dangerous waste issues of nuclear, nor would it be at risk from terrorist attack.
A very small CSP power stations installed in a very small proportion of the U.S. deserts could generate most to all of Americas energy needs.
A macro CSP project is being put forward by an NGO called TREC (Trans Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation) comprising European and African members have put forward a cooperative plan for powering Saharan countries and the EU using a network of low loss grid lines linked to very large CSP schemes in the Sahara.
Developed by a German NGO in conjunction with the German government and German Aerospace Centre, TREC demonstrates that an area 250 square miles in the Moroccan-Algerian Sahara can generate all of Europe’s electricity needs. An area of 450 square miles can generate the global energy requirements as projected for 2030. The electricity would be delivered by DC power lines that have a far lower loss of energy in transmission than AC, thereby liberating Europe and the world of its dependence on such unreliable energy providers as Russia, Iran and Iraq etc. (see map).
For illustration: Areas of the size as indicated by the red squares would be sufficient for Solar Thermal Power Plants to generate as much electricity as is currently consumed by the World, by Europe (EU-25) and by Germany respectively. (Data provided by the German Aerospace Centre (DLR), 2005)
Schemes along coastal areas could also desalinate very large quantities of seawater into drinking or irrigation water and enough electricity to pump it anywhere.
Costal regions within the highlighted areas in the map above would be highly suitable for CSP desalination. In fact these are the areas of the world that suffer from the most extreme water shortages.
There almost seems to be a conspiracy to keep this in the dark. CSP was not even included in Princeton University’s ‘15 Carbon Wedges’ despite the fact that it is capable of delivering more electricity than all of them put together.
The micro applications of CSP for the developing world are provide cheap to build off-grid local CSP power stations. It can also be used for low tech solar cooking and incredibly simple and cheap new methods of water pasteurisation, resulting from this simple solar cooking technology, which could impact the annual death of 5 million children from water borne diseases and cause a reduction in deaths from smoke inhalation (WHO estimates 1.6million people die annually from hazards related to the use of biomass for cooking fuel).
Solar cooking impacts many other environmental and humanitarian issues such as deforestation; 1billion tonnes of firewood are being cut every year for cooking fuel, women’s protection, medical sterilization in rural hospitals and water desalination.
Despite the thunderous impact CSP can have on poverty reduction the U.N. has deselected it from eligibility for UN Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) funding on a feeble red tape pretext. CDM funding is only available for projects involving aforestation or reforestation. Since at the minimum solar cooking can help stop deforestation this seems insane.
To date only one major world periodical has carried a comprehensive story on this despite the phenomenal relevance of this technology in today’s troubled times. Most MP’s and scientists are completely ignorant of its implications, energy security and cost effectiveness let alone its existence. It is high time everybody, including Bush and Blair, did something about it. It is important that world leaders actually lead the way in providing environmentally sound, safe energy supply that helps combat climate change rather than taking us along the incredibly dangerous and short-term nuclear route to Armageddon.
Given Germanys hosting of the G8 this year and Merkels and German Governments involvement in the development of CSP technology and its prioritisation of Africa, our aim is to get CSP to the top of the G8 agenda.
Economically extremely competitive, we should all know about this and yet nobody does. Ultimately energy decisions are economic. CSP is the missing piece of the renewable jigsaw puzzle. The sustainable alternative to nuclear. The secure energy supply of the future.