Construction of World's Largest Solar Power Plant Begins
Last week California's Governor Jerry Brown was joined by U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar for the ground breaking ceremony of the world's largest solar thermal facility near Blythe, California, reported constructiondigital.com.
Once construction is completed, the site will feature four solar thermal power plants with a total generating capacity of 1,000 megawatts of electricity. This would be enough energy to power 800,000 (corrected by construction.am according to the US Energy Department data) American homes using a clean, domestic source of fuel. Blythe Solar will cover about 7,025 acres of land.
Governor Brown praised the solar power plant as a key step toward his goal of building a green economy of the future in California."We're going to be the world leader in solar energy," Brown said during the groundbreaking ceremony.
Preparations for the facility have been underway since 2010, with early work already being done on the first two solar power plants that will be able to generate 242 megawatts of electricity. The first two plants are expected to be operational and connected to California's power grid by 2014.
In April the Blythe solar project received a loan guarantee of $2.1 billion from the US Federal Financing Bank. The total projected cost of the project is expected to reach about $2.8 billion. The facility is being built by the Solar Trust of America and the Solar Millennium Group, two of the world's top producers of solar thermal technology.
The Solar Millennium Group built the first operational parabolic trough power plants in Europe. Parabolic trough is the only type of solar technology that has been proven since the 1980s to be able to produce enough electricity for commercial use in large power plants.
Once construction is completed, the site will feature four solar thermal power plants with a total generating capacity of 1,000 megawatts of electricity. This would be enough energy to power 800,000 (corrected by construction.am according to the US Energy Department data) American homes using a clean, domestic source of fuel. Blythe Solar will cover about 7,025 acres of land.
Governor Brown praised the solar power plant as a key step toward his goal of building a green economy of the future in California."We're going to be the world leader in solar energy," Brown said during the groundbreaking ceremony.
Preparations for the facility have been underway since 2010, with early work already being done on the first two solar power plants that will be able to generate 242 megawatts of electricity. The first two plants are expected to be operational and connected to California's power grid by 2014.
In April the Blythe solar project received a loan guarantee of $2.1 billion from the US Federal Financing Bank. The total projected cost of the project is expected to reach about $2.8 billion. The facility is being built by the Solar Trust of America and the Solar Millennium Group, two of the world's top producers of solar thermal technology.
The Solar Millennium Group built the first operational parabolic trough power plants in Europe. Parabolic trough is the only type of solar technology that has been proven since the 1980s to be able to produce enough electricity for commercial use in large power plants.
