The construction of the world's largest thermal solar power station has been completed.

Yes, really good news: the construction (and related tests) of a solar power plant in the Mojave Desert has finally been completed. This station is the largest in the world, its area is 14.24 square kilometers (5.5 square miles). This object is called Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System. This station refers to the type of thermal solar power plants.



This station is capable of producing about 30% of all "thermal energy" produced in the United States. The facility has 3 towers 140 meters high, surrounded by 300,000 mirrors the size of a garage door. All these mirrors focus the sun's rays on the collector, located at the top of the tower. In the upper part of the tower there is also a water reservoir, where all the thermal energy collected by the mirrors goes.

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Each tower also has its own control center, plus there is a common control center, from where the work of the entire system is controlled. At the same time, according to the company that created the station, there is no storage for molten salt in the system, as in the case of smaller projects, such as Crescent Dunes .



It is worth noting that each of the mirrors can change the angle of inclination and the direction of inclination on command from the center. Once a fortnight mirrors are washed. As far as one can understand, a special system for washing mirrors is used + a special team of cleaners who clean the mirrors at night. A proprietary system SFINCS (Solar Field Integrated Control System) was created to control all the mirrors.



The entire system consists of 22 million individual parts (rivets, bolts, etc., is not considered).



The total cost of the project was 2.2 billion US dollars, of which 1.4 is a federal loan.







At the same time, water vapor is generated in the system, which is directed to the blades of turbines that produce energy, which is quite enough for the needs of 140,000 California households.







True, not without problems. For example, focused sun rays burn birds flying above the station. This fact is the cause of protests of US environmental organizations. But, despite all the protests, the project was completed and launched.































Via theverge