Showa Shell Solar, Saudi Aramco to Build (80MW pilot PV) Solar Power Plant in Saudi Arabia

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews/articleid/3462135

Showa Shell Solar, Saudi Aramco to Build Solar Power Plant in Saudi Arabia

Monday, September 07, 2009 9:53 AM

(Source: Datamonitor)trackingJapan-based Showa Shell Sekiyu has said that its subsidiary Showa Shell Solar and Saudi Aramco have signed a memorandum of understanding to conduct tests and build a 10MW pilot solar power plant in Saudi Arabia.

Showa Shell Solar has said that its 2sqkm silicon-free, copper-indium-selenium panels are capable of generating 80W of power.

Faisal Habiballah, head of the Saudi Aramco team that is leading the initiative, said: "Technology has advanced. It is much more cost-effective, much more efficient and much more durable. It is more attractive to use now.

"The fossil fuels can be used for high-value industry and high-value conversion products rather than burning it. They can generate more revenue for the company and the country."

…

[OKIsItJustMe]

1. Showa Shell Solar to construct third CIS PV plant: 900MW capacity

http://www.pv-tech.org/news/_a/showa_shell_to_construct_third_cis_pv_plant_expected_capacity_900mw/

Showa Shell Solar to construct third CIS PV plant: 900MW capacity

07 September 2009 | By Emma Hughes | News > Thin Film, Power Generation

In a move which compliments the news of Japan's recent government support for renewables, Showa Shell Sekiyu K.K. and its 100% subsidiary Showa Shell Solar K.K. have decided to construct their third CIS PV plant in Miyazaki Prefecture, which is planned to start operations in 2011.

Showa Shell began production of its first CIS thin-film 'Solacis' module plant back in 2007, which now has an annual capacity of 20MW. Since then the company constructed a second in the first quarter of 2009, with an annual capacity of 60MW and most recently, announces the plans for a third.

The annual production capacity of the third plant is aimed at reaching the 900MW mark, with an investment of approximately 100 billion yen. Combined with the first plant and the second plant that are already in operation, Showa Shell's total annual production capacity is expected to reach approximately 1GW.

Showa Shell will also purchase the Miyazaki Plant owned by Hitachi Plasma Display located in Kunitomi-cho, Higashimorokata-gun, Miyazaki, and install equipment there in order to get the third plant's construction under way as soon as possible. Production from the plant will be sold in Japan and around the world for various uses including residential, industrial and solar power generation. Research and development of production technology for this third plant will be conducted at Atsugi Research Center.

…

[azul]

2. Thinking ahead with investment.

For the day when maybe burning fossil fuels will be an enviornmental crime?

Or maybe just trying to set an example of good world citizenship, and to demonstrate that it can be done?

[NNadir]

3. In the future, I predict from a purely financial standpoint...

every dangerous fossil fuel invested rapacious system, government or company will find it useful to build a MW scale solar plant, not because any of them will ever produce significant energy - an 80 MW anything running at 20% of capacity utilization is a joke in Saudi Arabia - but because it's marketing value is enormous.

It is relatively easy to distract people from say, billion ton quantities of dangerous fossil fuel waste dumping by yelling, "Look!!!!! Over there!!! My new "world's largest" solar plant!"

It is relatively easy of course, for rich people to build "world's largest" solar plants too, since all of them are tiny and well, insignificant.

[comtec]

4. Why build a cell farm, when a sodium farm is far better

Or do i misunderstand the kind of solar plant they are making?
The advantage to a Sodium plant is that the super heated sodium causes steam which turns turbines, all night, providing 24-hours power generation. Less at night than in the day, but the need at night is also less.

At least that's how I understand those to work.

[joshcryer]

5. Those are also about 2% efficient, if I recall correctly. PV is much much higher.

Sterling thermal is pretty high, too.

[comtec]

7. Fair point, but they're a lot cleaner

If you believe the anti-solar crowd.
PV manufacture requires a lot of toxic materials and waste.
A sodium plant can be built for relative pennies with easily attainable materials, as opposed to PV panels which requite a much higher tech level base.
I'd say the sodium would be good for low-tech base countries like africa and bits of India.

[joshcryer]

8. Where there is a lot of light (as in this example) I do agree that solar thermal is preferrable.

[comtec]

10. With so much area... why not just make a larger sodium bell?

Mat black so it'll absorb every ounce, perhaps increasing it's effectiveness?

Additionally they have probably discovered a better material by now - however sodium is EVERYWHERE and is probably a cheaper material in general... but we'll see.

Common sense is not the king of thing I expect from corporations on this... and as someone said this is probbaly a "my cock is SOOOO big" kind of bullshit you see coming out of these ME kingdoms anyway *coughDUBAIcough*

[OKIsItJustMe]

11. Consider…

Where does steam come from? (Water)

What is in short supply in the desert? (Water)

Dish Stirling might be more efficient at the moment, but PV is cheaper.

[comtec]

12. The water can easily be kept in a closed system...

you run the steam pipes into the ground and use geo cooling to revert the steam back into water, then run it back up.

It doesn't have to be water par-say, but it's the most plentiful commodity on earth.

and by using the earth's fairly constant 55F to cool the steam back into water, you are also preventing needing a cooling technology.

Mind you I think you can also use PV in between reflectors as well imho.

Perhaps an idea sol farm would use both, but if you're looking to build a model for poorer countries, the sodium tower is really the way to go on many levels.

[OKIsItJustMe]

13. This is one of the advantages of "Solar Stirling" (AKA "Dish Stirling) i.e. it is a closed system

http://www.sandia.gov/news/resources/releases/2008/solargrid.html

(I don't see why you couldn't use a Stirling engine to generate power from the heated sodium, rather than a steam boiler…)

The thing that keeps bringing me back to PV though is its (relative) lack of moving parts. (Some PV systems follow the Sun, to maximize efficiency, but, this is an absolute requirement for concentrating solar thermal systems.)


I want to know what is happening with this:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/earth/4243793.html

Super Soaker Inventor Aims to Cut Solar Costs in Half

By Logan Ward
Published on: January 8, 2008

Solar energy technology is enjoying its day in the sun with the advent of innovations from flexible photovoltaic (PV) materials to thermal power plants that concentrate the sun’s heat to drive turbines. But even the best system converts only about 30 percent of received solar energy into electricity—making solar more expensive than burning coal or oil. That will change if Lonnie Johnson’s invention works. The Atlanta-based independent inventor of the Super Soaker squirt gun (a true technological milestone) says he can achieve a conversion efficiency rate that tops 60 percent with a new solid-state heat engine. It represents a breakthrough new way to turn heat into power.

Johnson, a nuclear engineer who holds more than 100 patents, calls his invention the Johnson Thermoelectric Energy Conversion System, or JTEC for short. This is not PV technology, in which semiconducting silicon converts light into electricity. And unlike a Stirling engine, in which pistons are powered by the expansion and compression of a contained gas, there are no moving parts in the JTEC. It’s sort of like a fuel cell: JTEC circulates hydrogen between two membrane-electrode assemblies (MEA). Unlike a fuel cell, however, JTEC is a closed system. No external hydrogen source. No oxygen input. No wastewater output. Other than a jolt of electricity that acts like the ignition spark in an internal-combustion engine, the only input is heat.

Here’s how it works: One MEA stack is coupled to a high- temperature heat source (such as solar heat concentrated by mirrors), and the other to a low-temperature heat sink (ambient air). The low-temperature stack acts as the compressor stage while the high-temperature stack functions as the power stage. Once the cycle is started by the electrical jolt, the resulting pressure differential produces voltage across each of the MEA stacks. The higher voltage at the high-temperature stack forces the low-temperature stack to pump hydrogen from low pressure to high pressure, maintaining the pressure differential. Meanwhile hydrogen passing through the high-temperature stack generates power.

“It’s like a conventional heat engine,” explains Paul Werbos, program director at the National Science Foundation, which has provided funding for JTEC. “It still uses temperature differences to create pressure gradients. Only instead of using those pressure gradients to move an axle or wheel, he’s using them to force ions through a membrane. It’s a totally new way of generating electricity from heat.”

…

Animation of the JTEC can be viewed here:
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/static/jtec

[joshcryer]

6. In the future I predict climate change is going to matter way more than it does now.

Rendering fossil fuel producers either 1) irrelevant (banned) or 2) required to sequester every single ounce of CO2 they produce (make it into limestone).

[Nihil]

9. Temptation ... temptation ...

> Showa Shell Solar has said that its 2sqkm silicon-free, copper-indium-selenium
> panels are capable of generating 80W of power.

... damn it!
:evilgrin: