Solar Energy tower in Australia

The worlds larger solar tower will be built in Australia, it will be done in 2005 and will work without having a negative impact over the environment.  It will generate 200mw all over a surface of 5 square km of solar cells.

The tower will be built within 2 years and will cost 380 millions of euros, I will transform the mass of the energy in air.  To keep the warmth during night the platform will be over solar tubes filled with water.   Those panels heat the air that goes to a chimney.

Days and Nights

As the hot air tends to raise and the environmental temperature diminishes a degree each one hundred meters of altitude, an airflow crosses the chimney permanently driving thirtytwo turbines, of a capacity of 6.5 MW each one, that are the ones that feed the generator . The power station will generate electricity thus all the day and all the night and all thanks to solar energy.

The solar power station its like a huge chimney and it will be installed in the region of Buronga, 625 kilometers to the Southeast of Sydney. Its emanations consist solely of hot airflows and steam, which turns it into a totally ecological initiative.

At the present time, Australia obtains 90% of the electricity through coal power stations, which are highly polluting. In order to produce 200MW and to illuminate 200,000 homes, these power stations generate 900,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year.

The solar energy radiation that the Earth receives in less than one hour is equivalent to the human consumption of energy of a year and giving it a thought, in less than 20 years, more than billion people will take advantage of the energy emitted by the “star king”.

The Answer for the desert

If the project is successful, the promoter company, Schlaich Bergermann and Partner, of Stuttgart, will build other four power stations in Australia before 2010 and is possible that more will be built in the United States and Canada, as well as in Mexico and Spain.

The company has acquired the rights to even develop this technology in Jordan, Vietnam, China, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Egypt. To confirm their effectiveness and environmental iniquity, towers of this type would be the power solution of the desert regions of the world.

In 1982 the beginning of operation in an installation was proven in a Spain pilot of 50 kW in Manzanares (Madrid). The chimney had a small of only 195 meters, and the field of collectors a diameter of 240 meters. It worked during seven years and now it is used in Australia with better conditions, being in a very sunny region with ample uninhabited spaces around.

The facilities combine a fascinating and simple way of the physical phenomena of the chimney and conservatory effect. The process is the following one: under a flat and round glass ceiling air by means of solar energy is warmed up and raises through a located chimney in the center of the circle and impels an air turbine that is located in the lower part of the chimney.