Nevada Solar One is a concentrated solar power plant, with a nominal capacity of 64 MW and maximum steam turbine power output up to 72 MW net (75 MW gross), spread over an area of . The projected CO₂ emissions avoided are equivalent to taking approximately 20,000 cars off the road. The project required an investment of $266 million

USD The United States dollar (symbol: $; currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introduced the U.S. dollar at par with the Spanish silver dollar, divided it int ...

, and the project officially went into operation in June 2007. Electricity production is estimated to be 134 GWh ( gigawatt hours) per year. In 2007, when the plant came on line, it was the second

solar thermal energy Solar thermal energy (STE) is a form of energy and a technology for harnessing solar energy to generate thermal energy for use in Industrial sector, industry, and in the residential and commercial sectors. Solar thermal collectors are classified ...

(STE) power plant built in the United States in more than 16 years, and in 2007, the largest STE plant built in the world since 1991. It is located in Eldorado Valley in the southwest fringe of Boulder City,

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

, and was built in that city's Energy Resource Zone, which requires renewable generation as part of plant development permits; Nevada Solar One was approved as part of Duke Energy's larger El Dorado Energy project, which built 1 GW of electrical generation capacity. The solar trough generation was built by Acciona Solar Power, a partially owned subsidiary of Spanish conglomerate Acciona Energy. Lauren Engineers & Constructors (Abilene, TX) was the EPC contractor for the project. Acciona purchased a 55 percent stake in Solargenix (formerly Duke Solar), and Acciona owns 95 percent of the project. Nevada Solar One is unrelated to the Solar One power plant in

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

History

In 2006, located north of Tucson, Arizona Public Service's Saguaro Solar Facility opened, with 1 MW of electrical generation capacity. Nevada Solar One went online for commercial use on June 27, 2007. It uses similar technology and was constructed over a period of 16 months. The total project site is approximately , while the solar collectors cover .

Technology

Nevada Solar One uses proprietary technology to track the sun's location and concentrate its rays during peak demand hours. The plant uses 760 parabolic trough concentrators with more than 182,000 mirrors that concentrate the sun's rays onto more than 18,240 solar receivers placed at the focal axis of the troughs. These contain a heat transfer fluid that heats up to and is used to produce steam that drives a Siemens SST-700

steam turbine A steam turbine or steam turbine engine is a machine or heat engine that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work utilising a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Sir Charles Par ...

, adapted to the specific requirements of the CSP technology, which is connected to a generator to produce electricity. The mirrors are manufactured by Flabeg AG in Germany. In contrast to the power tower concentrator concept that California's original Solar One project uses. The specially coated tubes, made of glass and steel, were designed and produced by Solel Solar Systems as well as by Schott Glass in Germany. Motion control was supplied by Parker Hannifin, from components by Ansco Machine Company. Solar thermal power plants designed for solar-only generation are well matched to summer noon peak loads in areas with significant cooling demands, such as the southwestern United States. Using thermal energy storage systems, solar thermal operating periods can be extended to meet base load needs. Given Nevada's land and sun resources, the state has the theoretical ability to have more than 600 GW of electrical generation capacity using solar thermal concentrators like those used by Nevada Solar One. It has been proposed that massive expansion of solar plants such as Nevada Solar One has the potential to provide sufficient electricity to power the entire United States. Parabolic concentrator facilities have been successfully operating in

's Mojave Desert commercially since 1984, with a combined generating capacity of 354MW from the Solar Energy Generating Systems.

Production

Nevada Solar One's production is as follows (values in GW·h). Fossil backup, night time preservation, and morning pre-heating, is provided by natural gas and provides up to 2% of total output.

In popular culture

Nevada Solar One served as inspiration for the HELIOS One solar power plant's geographic location in the 2010 videogame '' Fallout: New Vegas''.

References

PowerMag: Nevada Solar One, Boulder City, Nevada (12/15/2007)

External links