A 2,600-foot tower planned for the Arizona desert will be the world's second tallest structure and will be able to power 100,000 homes through hot air alone.
The solar updraft tower, designed by EnviroMission, will work by collecting hot air as it rises from the heated ground surrounding it. The very tall, narrow tower increases the strength of the hot air flowing upward, where it will turn 32 turbines along the way.
The tower will be able to produce 200 MW of electricity each day and, unlike solar power technologies, will be able to produce electricity at night too since heat from the ground will still be flowing upward and it will operate without the use of water.
This technology comes at a pretty steep price -- $750 million to build -- but since hot air is free, the operating costs going forward will be very minimal and the tower should last at least 80 years.
The tower will be made of concrete, which is a very carbon-heavy material, but the clean energy produced by the tower should cancel out the carbon emissions of making it within 2.5 years.
via CNN
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written by jakabsz, October 05, 2011
you wanted to say 200 MWhour instead of 200 MW? I don't how how big of an amount that is for one day, but MegaWatt is for sure the measurement unit for power (amount of energy exerted per unit time).
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written by Seamus Dubh, October 05, 2011
@jakabsz
No they got it right MW is a unit of production (usuialy in a 24 hour period), while MWhour is a unit of consumption.
But I digress, by these number it would produce about 8 1/3 MW per hour
No they got it right MW is a unit of production (usuialy in a 24 hour period), while MWhour is a unit of consumption.
But I digress, by these number it would produce about 8 1/3 MW per hour
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written by David Evans, October 05, 2011
I estimate the solar energy falling on the collecting area, averaged over 24 hours, at about 1,000 MW. A claimed output of 200 MW does not seem unreasonable.
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written by pr_coms, October 05, 2011
The central idea of the technology has drawn little other than comments from what appears would be science blog editors - the syntax bothers one correspondent and the techspeak another. . .but what about the idea that a scaled solar technology is under development that WILL not use water and WILL have higher reliability than PV wind etc! I seldom see comments about bridges suggesting the bridge MAY take the weight of traffic. . . the engineering modelling available to even extreme engineering is robust and much tested. Just wondering Jeff what actual renewable technologies you support (by the way nuclear is not renewable Jeff!) either in principal or through actual investment? The world isn't flat and beyond those trees Jeff there is (er sorry...and just for Jeff...may be) a forest.
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written by jon, October 05, 2011
To clarify, this IS solar, but it's just hot air.
Looks like huge reflecting mirror surface there in the pic right? Well, that's not what this is about. The surfaces you see are above the ground, heating the air at ground level. The heated air needs to move and as heat tends to rise, the heated air moves toward the tower. The forceful movement of air spins the turbines and voila, we have power.
Not much different from a hydroelectric dam, except instead of water turning the turbines, here we use heated airflow.
Jeff, up above, didn't bother to check this out. He just spouted off his standard denier screed. In fact, a system similar to this ALREADY EXISTS in Spain and is powering homes and businesses right this moment.
Looks like huge reflecting mirror surface there in the pic right? Well, that's not what this is about. The surfaces you see are above the ground, heating the air at ground level. The heated air needs to move and as heat tends to rise, the heated air moves toward the tower. The forceful movement of air spins the turbines and voila, we have power.
Not much different from a hydroelectric dam, except instead of water turning the turbines, here we use heated airflow.
Jeff, up above, didn't bother to check this out. He just spouted off his standard denier screed. In fact, a system similar to this ALREADY EXISTS in Spain and is powering homes and businesses right this moment.
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written by AlBreingan, October 06, 2011
I get cranky when reporters can’t be bothered to work out their energy and power – saying “produce 200 MW of electricity each day” is nonsensical from a scientific (ie the folks who defined the term) point of view.
Saying it can produce a constant (or peak) 200MW is fine, as is saying 200MWhours per day. This leaves us not knowing what the reporter means (or thought they meant). Geeks should do this instinctively, and not have to be constantly told.
See the section “Confusion of watts, watt-hours, and watts per hour” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watt
Saying it can produce a constant (or peak) 200MW is fine, as is saying 200MWhours per day. This leaves us not knowing what the reporter means (or thought they meant). Geeks should do this instinctively, and not have to be constantly told.
See the section “Confusion of watts, watt-hours, and watts per hour” at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watt
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written by Linda, October 06, 2011
I remember reading something about one of these in the New Scientist in July 2004 (Issue 245
. I found the technology very interesting. It was to be located in the Australian outback. Does anyone know what became of that project?
. I found the technology very interesting. It was to be located in the Australian outback. Does anyone know what became of that project?
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written by FHBrass, October 06, 2011
Back in the mid 1950's or perhaps the early 1960's there were a couple of short stories written in one of the pulp-science fiction magazines of the time that featured an inventor named Short who by accident created just such a tower out of plastic tubing. Don't dismiss something just because it doesn't meet your criteria for "solar" power because if we are ever to become energy independent it it going to take many different types of technology.
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written by Fencerdave, October 07, 2011
Always a fan of multitasking, my mind already jumped to "telephone tower" when I saw this.
Phone companies provide money and get a cheaper, taller tower.
Tower becomes slightly less expensive and becomes much more appealing to sprawling suburbians.
Win-Win?
Phone companies provide money and get a cheaper, taller tower.
Tower becomes slightly less expensive and becomes much more appealing to sprawling suburbians.
Win-Win?
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written by Fencerdave, October 07, 2011
It would seem that the tower in Australia was designed by the same company, Enviromission, but it was unfortunately never built.
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written by Tom, October 10, 2011
First the tower in Spain was not built to last and has been taken down, a shame for such a novel idea as this.
Second As a power professional I always enjoy the public's confusion as to what electrical power is measured in, at least they didn't refer to the terminal voltage as a unit of power capacity. A capacity of 200MW means at any moment in time it can produce 200 million watts of power, if it did that for an hour than you will have 200 MW hours of power and in a day it would produce 4800 MWH's of power, provided it had a constant output.
I have been waiting for this to be built, my concern is that since it is so tall how will it affect the local weather since it will be injecting moister ground level air into the atmosphere at an abnormally high elevation for the location it is being built. I'm sure it will at most provide a interesting cloud display in the desert but will likely attract all the nuts once it is operational.
Second As a power professional I always enjoy the public's confusion as to what electrical power is measured in, at least they didn't refer to the terminal voltage as a unit of power capacity. A capacity of 200MW means at any moment in time it can produce 200 million watts of power, if it did that for an hour than you will have 200 MW hours of power and in a day it would produce 4800 MWH's of power, provided it had a constant output.
I have been waiting for this to be built, my concern is that since it is so tall how will it affect the local weather since it will be injecting moister ground level air into the atmosphere at an abnormally high elevation for the location it is being built. I'm sure it will at most provide a interesting cloud display in the desert but will likely attract all the nuts once it is operational.
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written by Nick Palmer, October 14, 2011
Tom wrote:
my concern is that since it is so tall how will it affect the local weather since it will be injecting moister ground level air into the atmosphere at an abnormally high elevation for the location it is being built.
It shouldn't be too much different to the normal process of thermal formation whereby warm ground level air goes up to several thousand feet, in a vortex formation, then condenses into a cloud, if the humidity etc is suitable, or just disperses if it is not.
my concern is that since it is so tall how will it affect the local weather since it will be injecting moister ground level air into the atmosphere at an abnormally high elevation for the location it is being built.
It shouldn't be too much different to the normal process of thermal formation whereby warm ground level air goes up to several thousand feet, in a vortex formation, then condenses into a cloud, if the humidity etc is suitable, or just disperses if it is not.
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written by Susan Kraemer, October 16, 2011
A 200 MW power station is how big it is.
Energy production is always in megawatt-hours, and size is always in megawatts (MW) - or kilowatt-hours(KW), and kilowatts gigawatt-hours, gigawatts(GW).
So you can say it "produces x megawatt-hours of power".
Think about your own electricity bill. You are billed for using x number of kilowatt-hours a month.
But if you put in a solar array on your roof you would put up either a huge (say) 10 KW array or a tiny 0.25 KW array, which would produce lots or just a trickle of kilowatt-hours of electricity a day/month or year.
Energy production is always in megawatt-hours, and size is always in megawatts (MW) - or kilowatt-hours(KW), and kilowatts gigawatt-hours, gigawatts(GW).
So you can say it "produces x megawatt-hours of power".
Think about your own electricity bill. You are billed for using x number of kilowatt-hours a month.
But if you put in a solar array on your roof you would put up either a huge (say) 10 KW array or a tiny 0.25 KW array, which would produce lots or just a trickle of kilowatt-hours of electricity a day/month or year.
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written by James, October 21, 2011
I think the biggest problem i can see with a tower out in the middle of the Arizona desert is the fact that it's just that. out in the middle of nowhere, which would make logistics for not only building the tower, but maintaining it or replacing missing parts once it's built. They would need to build an airstrip big enough for a plane carrying a new turbine or a really long road, and the workers working there would be away from their families for a while (I muse admit I am saying all this without much knowledge of American geography. Where's the Arizona desert again?) anyway thats just my two cents 
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