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Thermal Solar Plant To Be Erected In Australia
connect4 writes: "An article from the bulletin explaining a plan to erect a 1km high solar convection wind turbine in outback Victoria - the worlds tallest construction. Projected output per tower: 200MW. Cost to build: A$670m. Footprint of tower: 20sq km
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/scotland/new si d_1699000/1699665.stm/
says that wind energy in Scotland with the help of wave and tidal resources could provide 60GW / 75% of the UK's energy requirements.
slashnik
Could you use the large "greenhouse" below to grow something that would not normally be sustainable? I guess it would take a small amount of the energy out, but it might be worth it.
If not, at least plant a forest, so that you have more heat capacity to work with over night when the sun is down.
Effect on the surrounding area? A one kilometer tower is going to cast a pretty damn big shadow.
Solar power... solar clock. Can you say tourism? I wonder how many people would want to stand in the shadow at 4:20?
Hammer of Truth
The way I see it, the turbines in this plant are likely to be as reliable as a hydro-electric turbine.
Hydro plants need dams, dams are big, destructive and (hopefully) very permanent.
Hopefully, instead of making new hydro plants, we'll make these things (need a cool acronym)instead.
Reminds me of This article I read a while ago.
-- My hovercraft is full of eels.
Has anyone looked at the possible effects this would have on local weather patterns?
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The article says nothing about the possible impact this will have on rain patterns in the area.
I've read that airliner jet streams appear to change weather patterns in the US, but jet streams seem minor compaired to 20 square kilometers worth of heat creating a permanent cloud in one location.
Won't this draw humidity that would otherwise fall in other nearby areas?
Australia hasn't caught on to energey effecent houses. Double glazed windows are installed for noise, not keeping the heat in. Most houses (every one more than 10 yrs old I've been in) have large vents that were required when heating was done with wood buring fires. Now they just let the heat out in the winter and heat in durring the summer. In the US you can find R30 insulation because its required by law for new homes. In Australia you would be hard pressed to find anything better than R5. If the goverment had any clue about how to help provide incentive, many of these wasteful houses could be fixed but the tax advanatges are only for people buying brand new houses or home owners that want to buy properly. There is nothing like the home loan deduction like in the US and propery values in Melbourne and Sydney aren't that bad compared to London or Palo Alto even though the average wage is about 1/4 of those places. At least you can still buy dorm sized places in the city for just about US$150k. I wonder if they will have energy saving windows...
Why build a permanent tower?
I've been thinking about this for a while-- for both power generation and city-wide air conditioning-- (though there are obvious dangers and complications.
Use a cloth tunnel that is raised by dirigibles as the chimney. Install the generators at the base.
The cloth chimney would presumably be cheaper-- although obviously less durable. But it would open the possiblilit for chimneys miles long.
I've also though that a kite at the end of the chimney (buffetted by the chimney's exhaust) could suppport the entire structure.
A light transparent, IR opaque chimney could increase the heat inside the chimney itself-- regardless of the area theat it draws from.
What is the advantage of having the generators off the ground? As long as the air flows through does it make a difference?
Another alternative would be ground based tunnels.
Erect an arched greenhouse-- and make it several hundred kilometers long-- run it up the side of a mountain. Instantly, LA could have cool ocean breezes, no temperature inversions and the American West would receive more rainfall (and smog).
But then-- what would happen to the rest of the world?
How much coal do you have to burn to make the glass for this thing?
Why don't they build this thing over a city? It shouldn't be impossible to construct a geodesic structure of steel frame above the highest buildings. Cities produce lots of excess heat in the sun, asphalt and concrete and all that.
Energy transport would be cheap over the short distance -- 200 MW would feed a 200,000 people city -- and it would even give some protection against the elements. Where it matters, where most people live.
This is a lot like OTEC (Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion) but in the atmosphere instead of the ocean. Great idea!
Why not build this in the middle of a large city?
The heat island effect in large urban areas can supposedly raise the temperature 4-5 degrees Farenheit. A 1km tall tower would certainly be a landmark for any city that built it, and you'd have the added benefit of not having to transmit the energy far. About 70-80% of a power plants energy is dissipated during distribution, so a one built in a urban area assuming 20-30% dissipation would be the equivalent of about 2 plants built in the countryside.
From the article: "The Manzanares plant ran for seven years, with minimal tuning and maintenance, delivering electricity both night and day" -- and that was from a 20 year old prototype. I'd expect the aussies to do much better with current tech, despite the increased scale.
Effect on the surrounding area? A one kilometer tower is going to cast a pretty damn big shadow.
Does a bear shit in the woods? If a tower casts a shadow in the middle of the outback, and no one is around to see it, does it really cast a shadow? :)
Population density in rural Victoria is what? .0001/km? And I don't think the kangaroos are going to complain. (I wonder how fast the shadow of the top of the tower would be moving along the ground? Could make a game of it.)
Expected average output? 200 MW peak output is what the article says... that's not the same as 200 MW average.
True. Also, these ugly "solar chimneys" aren't very efficient in terms of land area wasted per MW, when compared to every method of power generation. But then again, the aussies don't exactly have a better use for the land (aboriginals be damned).
Hmm. Come to think of it, Eco-terrorists might eventually have a field day if too many of these were built.
One silver lining, though, would be that at least we'd gain some experience building really tall towers, so that when we are finally able to manufacture ultrastrong carbon-based materials in a few years (like diamondoid), we'll have a headstart on building the "space elevators" we'll need to make solar power satellites, and spacedev in general, cost effective.
--
Power to the Peaceful
FUD. What happened at TMI? Something went wrong with the reactor and then all of the safety measures worked perfectly. No one was hurt. No radiation was released. The only thing that went wrong at TMI was the senseless media frenzy.
Chernobyl is a totally different situation. It was caused by porrly trained people performing a dangerous procedure they weren't supposed to be doing in a plant with hopeless safety features. The Chernobyl was a poorly designed reactor. End of story. Nuclear safety in the US is taken very seriously, and the reactors are designed to be robust, and fault-tolerant.