It ought to be possible to build the things with a fail-safe mode
wherein loss of power results in the mirrors defocussing. Shouldn't be
hard; the /hard/ thing, presumably, is getting them all pointing at the
_same_ spot. Making them /not/ do that should be easy.
And locking them in place, focussed, just seems like bad procedure --
again, there should be a defocussed mode which they can go to for
maintenance.
But I bet the plant operators have already figured all this out, with
20/20 hindsight....
On 05/27/2016 10:24 PM, ChemE Stewart wrote:
Fatal flaw: Lock mirrors in the morning for maintenance or lose power
to mirror motors but the sun keeps rising, thus the focal focal point
of up to 300 MW's of thermal flux moves down the tower, torching it.
Enough heat to collapse a tower under the right conditions.
http://solarindustrymag.com/update-nrg-confirms-cause-of-fire-at-ivanpah-solar-plant
On Friday, May 27, 2016, Blaze Spinnaker <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Oh noes, solar power incident results in ..... burnt tower.
This is why solar power is the solution to everything.
On Wed, May 25, 2016 at 6:31 AM, ChemE Stewart <[email protected]
<javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');>> wrote:
Oops, Default
Oops, Fire
http://www.investors.com/politics/commentary/ivanpah-solar-plant-catches-fire-but-taxpayers-get-burned/
Oops
On Wed, Dec 30, 2015 at 7:36 PM, Jed Rothwell
<[email protected]
<javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');>> wrote:
I wrote:
The taxpayers will get their money back eventually.
The power companies are not going to stop buying
electricity from this installation. They may
renegotiate the price . . .
Source:
I think I read this at Renewable Energy World, but I
cannot find the article. Anyway, that is the usual
arrangement. Since the machine is up and running, and
making a profit on current operations, the taxpayers
should be reimbursed. The owners may face bankruptcy.
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/index.html
The article went on to say this is quite different from
the situation at Solyndra. There was no revenue stream
when Solyndra went bankrupt. They did not have anything up
and running.
When a company goes bankrupt, if there are parts of the
company which are making a current profit, the courts are
careful to keep those parts in business. They try not to
sell off assets or do anything else which will disrupt
those parts and stop the flow of income. They try not to
cause more unemployment than necessary. On the other hand,
they direct the current profit flow to the creditors, and
away from stockholders. When Uncle Sam is among the
creditors or unpaid vendors, he always goes to the front
of the line. That's how it works.
The Solyndra bankruptcy has been called a scandal. It is
not a scandal. Any investment can go south. Many
governments supported ventures have failed. In this case,
the Solyndra portion of the fund failed but overall the
fund did exceptionally well and made a ton of money for
the taxpayers. You might argue that the Federal government
should not be investing in technology. That might appeal
to purists who think the government should play no role in
the economy, but as I have often pointed out, the
government has played a leading role since the
construction of the Erie Canal, and in ever major
technology since then. If it had not, I expect the U.S.
would have lost the Civil War, WWI and WWII.
Since most Federal money goes to conventional technology
such as coal and oil, I do not think the industry should
complain.
- Jed
