Solar thermal technology uses mirrors to concentrate sunlight, generating heat that produces steam to drive a turbine for electricity. In contrast, photovoltaic (PV) panels convert sunlight directly into electricity using semiconductor materials. While solar thermal can include energy storage with molten salt, PV is generally cheaper, more efficient, and easier to scale.
Ashalim producing power in 2022. You will see a blinding light when you drive by it in the desert
Here are examples of large-scale solar thermal projects:
Ivanpah Solar Power Facility (USA) – A $2.2 billion concentrated solar power (CSP) plant in California using heliostats (mirrors) to focus sunlight on central towers to generate steam for electricity. Struggled with efficiency and required natural gas backup.
Noor Ouarzazate Solar Complex (Morocco) – One of the world’s largest CSP projects, featuring multiple phases with parabolic trough and tower technology. Unlike Ivanpah, it successfully integrates molten salt storage for nighttime power generation.
Ashalim Solar Thermal Power Station (Israel) – Uses BrightSource’s CSP technology with a central tower and heliostats. Though innovative, it faced financial challenges and struggled to compete with cheaper photovoltaic (PV) alternatives.
As the energy market transitions from natural gas to renewable energy, the heat sector has become a focal point, representing a large share of global energy demand. Recent developments, particularly in the wake of the war in Ukraine, have triggered an increased drive for transition away from fossil fuels.
The Energy and Mines World Congress shows that 2019 will be considered the tipping point for solar and wind projects in the mining sector The Energy and Mines World Congress that took place in Toronto provided great insights into the recent developments of onsite renewable energy applications at remote mines. Getting power lines to remote […]
For business travelers and the curious who are coming to Israel, BrightSource has a pilot six-megawatt project in operation in the Rotem Industrial Park built in 2008, open to the public. A new visitor center may be built at the Ashalim plant.
Siemens, Germany’s giant electronics firm, appears to be in final stages of pulling out from its investment in Israel’s Solel Solar initiative. The four-year project began in 2009, when Siemens entered into an agreement to buy the Israeli solar company. The beleaguered solar energy projects company received what seems to be a death knell. Siemens […]
This is big news in the solar world: German giant Siemens, which recently unveiled photographs of its new headquarters in Masdar City, has recently announced that it’s selling off all of its solar assets, including Solel, an Israeli solar builder that the firm only acquired within the last few years for $418 million. “Due to […]
A flailing Egypt still aims for 20 percent renewables by 2020. Egypt’s Supreme Council of Energy last week pushed forward a new round of concessions aimed at boosting investment in renewable and clean energy in the country. According to the Council, it said it would exempt parts and components used in the production of electricity […]
Israeli solar thermal collectors made like honeycombs trap more heat from the sun to heat homes in cold countries like Germany. Israel is the land of milk and honey –– and solar hot water heaters. Practically every roof in Israel is fitted with a solar thermal collector to warm water for endless hot showers and […]
This wood waste may not look like fuel for a solar power plant, but it soon could be.
The world’s largest solar thermal plant – nearly double the size of the original largest in Denmark – is now online in Saudi Arabia, reinforcing the notion that this Gulf country has the potential to maintain its current oil wealth by exporting solar power for the next twenty centuries. Originally awarded to Jordan’s Millennium Energy […]
Able to store enough heat to generate power that can last well into the night, Masdar’s Gemasolar, built in Spain last year was state of the art in solar thermal energy storage, able to reach temperatures of over 500°C. Now a U.S. startup funded by the Obama administration energy department with a $3.3 million ARPA-E grant has […]
Desertec takes third step to reality in as many months with Sonelgaz agreement Algeria‘s state-owned Sonelgaz has just signed the third deal in the MENA region to export desert solar power to Europe, with a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to cooperate with the European Desertec Initiative (DII) in the export of solar from the country, […]
BrightSource vs. the desert tortoise. Is BSE too big to fail? Shortly after Google announced its largest investment to date in BrightSource Energy’s gargantuan solar thermal project, the Californian company filed its first $250 million public offering on Earth Day. Forbes calls this an initial test of the market’s appetite for utility-scale solar energy. A […]
Israel has already issued 25 conditional licenses to companies building solar energy installations near the Gaza strip. Israel’s National Public Utility Authority (PUA) has received numerous requests to build solar facilities along the edge of the Gaza strip, according to Xinhua News Agency. Two out of the eleven companies would provide 180MW of electricity generated […]
Breakthrough sustainable clean energy technology gets a field test in forward-thinking Abu Dhabi
As a Californian, I am very happy that BrightSource Energy has been first to break ground on the new solar power projects in California’s desert. After all, the brains of BrightSource Energy, Israel-based BrightSource Industries, which is responsible for the plant design and engineering, used to be Luz. Luz built the world’s pioneering solar thermal […]