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Anybody who fried ants or burned things with a magnifying glass can grasp how this works. It was a reasonable risk to build it and try to get the technology to scale. Putting aside stupid politicians, corruption and cost overruns, this was a cool idea worth trying.
Unfortunately, the 'beam' from the mirror to the tower was about 1000 degrees F. Fly thru it, birds get cooked alive. The birds were after insects that were attracted to the light. So it killed a lot of bugs too.
The game plan was to generate enough power to serve a city the size of Pasadena. They came close - 91% of goal. But it took years to get there. It was limited to heating the water to around 570 degrees. In a conventional power plant the water (steam) that runs the turbine/generator is twice that. Storing the heat after the sun went down was a major challenge.
The water that produces the steam is actually heated thru an exchanger filled with sodium. The mirrors heat the sodium. Sodium and water don't mix for those who skipped chemistry.
Sodium stays hot for a longer time than water when heated. It works in theory but is hard to scale.
It was expensive to build this generator because it was one of a kind and experimental. Capital costs aside, cost per megawatt hour was pretty low. Close to zero fuel cost. Imagine a car that never needed gasoline or to be charged.
Humans would never progress or advance technology without taking moonshots like this. It didnt work out for a lot of reasons. That didnt make it a stupid idea. Call it a calculated risk.
Unfortunately, the 'beam' from the mirror to the tower was about 1000 degrees F. Fly thru it, birds get cooked alive. The birds were after insects that were attracted to the light. So it killed a lot of bugs too.
The game plan was to generate enough power to serve a city the size of Pasadena. They came close - 91% of goal. But it took years to get there. It was limited to heating the water to around 570 degrees. In a conventional power plant the water (steam) that runs the turbine/generator is twice that. Storing the heat after the sun went down was a major challenge.
The water that produces the steam is actually heated thru an exchanger filled with sodium. The mirrors heat the sodium. Sodium and water don't mix for those who skipped chemistry.
Sodium stays hot for a longer time than water when heated. It works in theory but is hard to scale.It was expensive to build this generator because it was one of a kind and experimental. Capital costs aside, cost per megawatt hour was pretty low. Close to zero fuel cost. Imagine a car that never needed gasoline or to be charged.
Humans would never progress or advance technology without taking moonshots like this. It didnt work out for a lot of reasons. That didnt make it a stupid idea. Call it a calculated risk.
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