Solar energy is marginally useful in the southern and Southwestern United States, but has little value elsewhere in the U.S.. If electricity storage batteries are included, the solar plus batteries cost would be huge.
The two types of solar power are Photo Voltaic (PV) Solar Panels, and Concentrating Solar. Three types of concentrating solar: Tower; Trough; and Parabolic." Concentrating solar -- using mirrors and reflectors -- is a total loser -- expensive to build, providing expensive electricity, and unreliable.
Solar energy is unreliable, intermittent, and not needed in the United States. We have huge supplies of natural gas. And natural gas power plants (NGCC) are the least expensive to build, provide the least expensive electricity, and are very reliable, both day and night.
PV solar panels can be put on roof tops, or in open fields. They are marginally viable in areas where there are high solar energy levels, which only occur in the Southwestern United States. ... It takes over 10 years for a Florida homeowner to recover an investment in PV rooftop solar. In the northern states, snow and ice-cover suppress the electricity output.
There are 90 (76 trough and 14 tower plants) concentrating solar plants in 14 countries -- 31 have thermal storage, typically salt, that allow the plants to operate for up to 10 hours after sunset. There have been so many problems with concentrating solar that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has issued a Best Practices report, identifying many of the problems.
Only 9 of the 90 were built in the United States: Three Ivanpah towers, two Genesis towers, a single Nevada tower, and two Mojave trough installations. The 9th, the Crescent Dunes tower, was shut down due to equipment failure, primarily with the salt thermal storage system. Concentrating solar is not economically viable even in the Southwestern states, where solar energy levels are the highest.
According to the NREL report, the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) for concentrating solar is about 20 cents per kWh, versus NGCC (natural gas) power plants at only 6 cents per kWh. The NGCC power plant is much more reliable, and operates during the day ... and during the night.
The Ivanpah concentrated solar plant uses three towers where a sea of mirrors focuses sunlight onto receivers at the top of each tower. The mirrors are on motorized pivots so they can follow the sun across the sky. Birds flying through the concentrated sunlight are killed by the intense, hot beams of light.
Trough systems rely on long rows of troughs with a parabolic shape that aims the sunlight onto a tube, that carries a fluid, that drives a turbine generator. Separation of hydrogen from the fluid has been a major problem at these installations.
The parabolic system uses parabolic reflectors to focus sunlight onto a receptor. The sunlight heats a fluid, that drives a sterling engine, that generates electricity. Few parabolic systems have been used commercially.
Solar power can be a good alternative for nations like Spain and Morocco, that lack cheap natural gas or oil. Sunny Saudi Arabia can use solar power to conserve their valuable oil or natural gas ... products they can sell to other nations for a profit.
