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That is such a smart design (using mirrors to focus sunlight onto one point rather than using lots of solar panels spread about). How long have scientists had t

by Tycho 16y ago

That is such a smart design (using mirrors to focus sunlight onto one point rather than using lots of solar panels spread about). How long have scientists had this idea?

parfe 16y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes#The_Archimedes_Heat_Ray http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes#The_Archimedes_Heat_... Two millennia or so. Power generation has always been applying new ways to boil water (save wind and hydro).
- Tycho 16y ago
  Actually I misconstrued what the design was. I thought the mirrors would project a higher concentration of sunlight onto a traditional solar panel (except one designed to accept much higher input/density), thus saving the cost of making many panels and many periodic replacements. Mirrors are presumably cheaper and/or more durable than solar panels.
jacques_chester 16y ago
I remember seeing 1970s vintage books with these sorts of things in them. The main difficulty is maintaining a high temperature system with lots of moving parts, but in that respect it's not much worse than a fossil fuel plant. Edit: not forgetting the usual source reliability / distribution problems for renewables.
icegreentea 16y ago
A good while. There's actually a plant of this design (smaller though, only 20MW) outside of Seville, it's been there for a while. Also, to the sister post, there are relatively few moving parts in the collector itself. Furthermore, these are all conditions that we've dealt with already with traditional turbine systems (they get pretty hot too), and aircraft design. The harder part is getting the sun tracking right. The Seville (and I guess this one too) plant actually has to point a bunch of mirrors off the tower (they park them into a tower of light above the tower... looks really cool) at peak, since it actually gets too hot (it would melt concrete or something ridiculous I heard...) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS20_solar_power_towers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS20_solar_power_towers
mcdaid 16y ago
Seville has one http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stm but the idea is as old, Archimedes is said to have used mirrors to set fire to a roman fleet.
shimonamit 16y ago
The first experimental solar power towers were built in the 1980s. The first commercial plant was constructed in Seville, Spain and became operational in 2007.
jdavid 16y ago
I remember them being in Sim City 2000. ;-) So, it's been a while. I am actually disappointed in the video. There were no 3d models, and the project talked very little about the engineering effort. Instead we are given very stoic music and a bunch of PR.
uvdiv 16y ago
The New York Times was writing about concentrated solar power as early as 1868, in the context of the imminent exhaustion of coal. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40A10FB38541B7493C2A81782D85F4C8684F9 http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40A10FB3854...

by Tycho 16y ago

That is such a smart design (using mirrors to focus sunlight onto one point rather than using lots of solar panels spread about). How long have scientists had this idea?

parfe 16y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes#The_Archimedes_Heat_Ray http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes#The_Archimedes_Heat_... Two millennia or so. Power generation has always been applying new ways to boil water (save wind and hydro).

Tycho 16y ago
Actually I misconstrued what the design was. I thought the mirrors would project a higher concentration of sunlight onto a traditional solar panel (except one designed to accept much higher input/density), thus saving the cost of making many panels and many periodic replacements. Mirrors are presumably cheaper and/or more durable than solar panels.

jacques_chester 16y ago

I remember seeing 1970s vintage books with these sorts of things in them. The main difficulty is maintaining a high temperature system with lots of moving parts, but in that respect it's not much worse than a fossil fuel plant. Edit: not forgetting the usual source reliability / distribution problems for renewables.

icegreentea 16y ago

A good while. There's actually a plant of this design (smaller though, only 20MW) outside of Seville, it's been there for a while. Also, to the sister post, there are relatively few moving parts in the collector itself. Furthermore, these are all conditions that we've dealt with already with traditional turbine systems (they get pretty hot too), and aircraft design. The harder part is getting the sun tracking right. The Seville (and I guess this one too) plant actually has to point a bunch of mirrors off the tower (they park them into a tower of light above the tower... looks really cool) at peak, since it actually gets too hot (it would melt concrete or something ridiculous I heard...) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS20_solar_power_towers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS20_solar_power_towers

mcdaid 16y ago

Seville has one http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stm but the idea is as old, Archimedes is said to have used mirrors to set fire to a roman fleet.

shimonamit 16y ago

The first experimental solar power towers were built in the 1980s. The first commercial plant was constructed in Seville, Spain and became operational in 2007.

jdavid 16y ago

I remember them being in Sim City 2000. ;-) So, it's been a while. I am actually disappointed in the video. There were no 3d models, and the project talked very little about the engineering effort. Instead we are given very stoic music and a bunch of PR.

uvdiv 16y ago

The New York Times was writing about concentrated solar power as early as 1868, in the context of the imminent exhaustion of coal. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40A10FB38541B7493C2A81782D85F4C8684F9 http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F40A10FB3854...