Arizona building concentrated solar thermal plant with power storage

They are a bit short on facts and figures (nothing new as industry guards those closely).

 

Be interesting to know:

1. The expected average hourly output - is it the full 290 mW? From some articles it sounds like they are looking at the peak evening consumption period which may mean they are not talking about 24 hour generation.

2. The specific consumption of water - I just read that for troughs it is 0.8 gallons per kW

3. Approximate expected operating costs per mW

4. Approximate expected maintenance cost per mW

 

These facts are well known for gas and coal but not for CSP.

 

APS says nothing about contracted per mW costs though it seems they would be public records.

 

Maybe someone has the knowledge to calculate this correctly. Good sun is given as 320 days per year in Phoenix and maybe the plant has 90% availability what tarif is required to repay the 2.7 billion over 20 years.

 

A Sandia site with a little information about molten salt and storage capacities.

 

www.sandia.gov/Renewable_Energy/solarthermal/NSTTF/salt.htm

 

Still seem to need makeup cooling water as there are cooling towers. I had been under the impression that water requirements would be low but it looks otherwise. Cooling tower technology is standard and well known. Cooling towers in the desert and at high ambient temperatures will 'drink' water in substantial quantities! 

From http://www.technologyreview.com/Biztech/20356/

 

About the Arizona CSP plant with molten salt heat storage - 

 

The amount of storage included in a plant--expressed as the number of hours that it can keep the turbine running full tilt--will vary according to capital costs and the needs of a given utility. "There is an optimal point that could be three hours of storage or six hours of storage, where the cents per kilowatt- hour is the lowest," says Fred Morse, senior advisor for U.S. operations with Abengoa Solar. Morse says that the company's 280-megawatt plant in Arizona, set to begin operation by 2011, will have six hours of storage, while other recent projects promise seven to eight. 

The URL for a US Dept of Energy document titled Reducing Water Consumption of CSP power generation.

 

http://www.nrel.gov/csp/pdfs/csp_water_study.pdf

 

It costs a bit more to use a lot less water according to what I read - probably well worthwhile.

 

 

Apparently the Starwood 1 plant is using conventional cooling (cooling towers) which uses approximately 3 liters of water per kW. If they were using a different cooling system to conserve water they would certainly be using that for good publicity.

 

Today I saw on the Starwood site FAQ's 

 

What will be the source of the water used for the project? How much water will the project use?

Starwood Solar I will use groundwater. Starwood anticipates that the solar generating facility will use an average of 2,155 acre-feet of water per year, considerably less than current agricultural use at the site. Aquifer impact studies will be performed to examine the potential effects of the project on groundwater resources, and those results will be discussed in the CEC application.

 

1 acre-foot is 325,851 gallons 

2155 acre-feet is a total of 722,000,000 gallons per year.

Good for a shower or two plus washing the car!

NO reduction in water consumption.  In fact, about a 10 time INCREASE in ground water consumption.  I live here, within 10 miles of 4 proposed solar plants. What water is currently used on that land (alfalfa field and short season melons) is CAP (Central Arizona Project) water.  The farmers in this area are PROHIBITED from taking more than a VERY MINIMAL amount of ground water (domestic and shop use ONLY).  The pumps are shut off 95% of the year and the water flows to the fields through a series of canals.

This neighborhood is pretty po'd about all the new plants.  We have "community" water systems, feeding 20-50 customers.  Our community wells are between 800-1100 feet deep.  The last energy plant that moved in out here-PGE- permitted the plant using CAP water as primary source with ground water back up (two sources of water are required for permitting).  The CAP water (if you didn't sign up 30 years ago) is excess allocation available to the Indian tribes.  They raised the price from $53 per acre foot to $96 per acre foot (Scottsdale bid the price up that high).  PGE negotiated a $90 per acre foot fee. THEN they NEGLECTED to inform the Arizona Corporation Commission that they were going to use the GROUND WATER as their primary water source. They just did it.  Decided on their own to substitute ground water for CAP water (Arizona and  the Indian tribes have excess CAP water which they sell to the highest bidder).

Rosevview, a small community that WAS about 20 familes is DIRECTLY south of the PGE plant. When PGE is pumping maximum water, Roseview has NO water.  There are now only FOUR families living in Roseview. They are hauling water in when the PGE pumps are going.  Not only do they not have their OWN water anymore, they are PAYING to haul 1000 gallons at a time from a water hauler who is 47 miles away. Talk about GREEN!!!!  How much more additional pollution to get the water out to these people???  And the ECONOMIC cost-each 1000 gallons costs $155.00.  One family, with a 3 yo home, is walking away from it. They can't afford WATER.  The community of

Roseview will most likely revert to a ghost town within a year.

This entire community (Harquahala) is going to fight HARD to force these solar plants to purchase CAP water.  We can't afford to haul water out here and our ground water is being depleted rapidly.  One BIG reason the farmers are FORCED to purchase CAP water-State of Arizona said they were depleting the ground water supply in 1989.  But it is OK for solar plants, who sell the power to other states and we Arizonans get NO benefit???  Renewable energy here in Arizona is $04.00 per kw HIGHER than nuke power (where the majority of Arizona power comes from). And Arizona has some of the HIGHEST energy costs in the USA.

PS-the nuke uses recycled City of Phoenix waste water that is carried almost 40 miles through an underground pipeline to Palo Verde Nuclear Generating  Plant.  So you get two uses out of the same water. THAT is GREEN!!!

Hi gotwater (though it sounds more like 'gotscrewed' would be appropriate,

Typical power plant water consumption figures - the plant definitely decided to ignore any water problem - cooling towers in the desert are real water monsters!

 
 

Water consumption
type	gal/mW	l per kW
coal	500	1,88
nuclear	500	1,88
NG combined cycle	200	0,75
trough CSP	800	3,00
dish engine	20	0,08
CSP	784	2,94
dry cooled trough	80	0,30
nat avg all thermal	470	1,76

Hi gotwater,

This might be of interest to you in your campaign. 

I have been reading about the 'Heller' cooling tower that is supposed to have a very low water requirement/consumption. I have zero experience with the Heller tower - all I know are the traditional types.

The article states they have never been used in the US but have elsewhere in the world with excellent success. The second is a pdf with good information.

Best Regards,
Russ

http://climateprogress.org/2009/04/29/csp-concentrating-solar-power-heller-water-use/ 

http://www.energy.ca.gov/pier/conferences+seminars/2005-06_advanced_cooling_conference/papers/F_Advanced_Heller_System_Technical_2005.pdf

Edited by Russ - 7/5/2009 at 07:11 pm GMT

Thank you for the information.  But a little late, I'm afraid.  The Mesquite plant, which is directly East of my house 8 miles, was just permitted.  Again, cooling towers using ground water. Although we have heard a bunch of rumors the last couple of weeks (hubby is an engineer at the nuke). Since Mesquite has a direct relationship with APS/SRP due to the direct tie into the switchyard and  APS just built another HUGE reservoir to hold all the City of Phoenix waste water, Mesquite MAY contract with APS for their processed water and only use the ground water for backup. That would solve their water problem, would make double use of City of Phoenix water and relieve the ground water situation.

Now for the other problems. The Starwood Solar plant will be OWNED ONLY by Starwood Solar.  It will be built and run by Lockheed.  Which essentially causes the other big problem just as with PGE-NO PERMANENT jobs.  Sure, they are willing to give those that live out here the grunt work construction jobs, but they hire IN HOUSE for the permanent jobs.  NOT ONE PGE employee lives in the area. NOT ONE PERMANENT PGE employee was hired from "the neighborhood.  They all drive at least 50 miles from the metro Phoenix area for work.  So our poor little area does not get any additional tax base other than the plant.  They closed our school and post office-not enough people.  They only do road maitenance now once a month (almost all dirt roads, so they get very rough very quickly).  The ONLY benefit from the PGE plant is a large property tax from the power plant itself of which 70% goes to the fire dept.  We have a VERY good fire dept for a poor, struggling agricultural area.  But we were also promised a $50,000 per year "contribution" for community betterment.   That lasted for 3 years-mostly during construction.  Then PGE filed bankruptcy and the $50,000 was lost in the shuffle.  We don't have the community center we were promised.  We don't have the gravel on the roads we were promised.  We don't have the diversion culverts we were promised to make our roads passable during "monsoon" season.  IF you don't have a 4 wheel drive with at least 36" tires, you often cannot get to your house.  The washes fill up and you can't drive through.  You don't know how many of us have spent the night on the side of the road because we couldn't get home due to flash flooding.

We anticipate the same treatment from the Starwood plant.  LOTS of promises, but with Lockheed in control and a slightly shaky proposal of who will REALLY control the money, we have no hopes of permanent jobs, a community fund to actually better the neighborhood or gravel for our roads.  There are three nuclear electricians, two nuclear certified welders, a nuclear certified crane operator and two carpenters in this neighborhood.  All have worked at Palo Verde for a long time until January-big layoff.  All are stuggling to find employment-it is a long drive to jobs that neither pay well or are permanent.  We were all looking forward to permanent jobs in this area.  But other than possibly the Mesquite plant, Lockheed has already pretty well made it known that they will be bringing people in from out of state to run the plant.  I quite my very good job at Palo Verde as a nuclear vendor inspector to take over the logistics/consumable procurement for Shaw when they built the PGE plant.  I was promised by PGE management, as were others from this area, a PERMANENT job when the plant was up and running.  PGE brought in the sister in law of a guy from CANADA who they needed as an engineer for the office manager position.  She lives 57 miles from the plant, had NO knowledge of a power plant (she was working for an insurance agency in Avondale, Arizona.). Nice lady, but there were much more qualified people IN THE AREA.  I anticipate the same treatment for the entire neighborhood from Lockheed.

All this solar stuff is merely a greed/governent funded action.  WE could very well be without water.  I could loose my home which is almost paid for.  The water delivery guy won't even drive the other 13 miles from Roseview to my house.  He says it is too expensive and he would have to charge me $230 for 1000 gallons of water.  I sure can't afford that on a twice weekly basis and I sure can't afford to drop a well that is over 1500 ft deep (well driller quoted over $25,000 dollars).

So don't be so gung ho for these solar projects. There are REAL consequences for REAL people.  Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station has permits for 9 more nukes.  Why isn't anyone promoting that???  Cleaner, less expensive to produce the power, and Palo Verde has all the water they need.  Water already in place without touching the ground water or buying expensive CAP water. They can even tie into another City of Phoenix waste water plant if needed.  THINK about the consequences for REAL people.

 

Don't get mad! Get revenge! as the old saying goes. Plan for your next chance to put a stick through their spokes? New permits will be needed for some reason.

The important thing is to be prepared and cool. If you fight with too much emotion the other guy will win. Fighting with a chip on ones shoulder often leads to a broken nose (no gain).

The big companies pay guys to think through problems and come up with goofy but acceptable solutions - you have to be one step ahead of them.

A study reported on terra daily from the University of Colorado in Boulder about water use and availability in the area where the CSP plants are going in.

Constructing users of large volumes of water would only make the situation worse.  
All reservoirs along the Colorado River might dry up by mid-century as the West warms, a new study finds. The probability of such a severe shortage by then runs as high as one-in-two, unless current water-management practices change, the researchers report.
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Colorado_River_Reservoirs_
Could_Bottom_Out_999.html

I like the Striling engine concept but the price they are placing on the project comes to 37,000 USD per household. At least one site mentioned 2.7 billion USD for 73,000 households. At that everyone could have their own PV system.

The water usage is definitely an improvement over others! 

SOLAR DEVELOPER ABANDONS WATER PLANS

Solar Millennium, a German developer, had proposed using as much as 1.3 billon gallons of water a year to cool a massive solar-power plant complex it wants to build in a desert valley 80 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

That divided the residents of Amargosa Valley, some of whom feared the solar farm would suck dry their aquifer. 

Now Solar Millennium says it will instead dry-cool the twin solar farms, which would result in a 90 percent drop in water consumption.

http://www.solartrustofamerica.com/news.cfm?newsID=26