concentrator

Rather than try to reinvent the solar cell, startup Thermata has engineered a high-tech mirror to cut the cost of solar power.

The company, incubated at Idealabs, has completed initial testing on a system executives say can cut the cost of sun-tracking mirrors, or heliostats, in half using cameras and other digital technologies. Thermata plans to start beta testing the heliostats this year with potential customers, which are concentrating solar power technology companies, and with Sandia National Laboratories.

Thermata typifies a new breed of green-technology startup which is targeting a specific niche in energy using technologies from other fields. Its … Read more

An engineering company in Italy has thought of a way to boost solar panels' production with concentrators while not taking up valuable land: put them on rafts.

Scienza Industria Tecnologia (SIT) this week detailed the solar generating system called Floating Tracking Cooling Concentrator, which is being tested in Italy and South Korea. The research company's hope is that these solar concentrators will be used on small lakes or artificial reservoirs on farms and quarries.

There are already solar arrays put on ponds, including a winery in California. But SIT is trying to use the water as an advantage for … Read more

A technique first developed to print flexible electronics has helped engineers at start-up Semprius reinvent the shape of concentrating solar technology.

The company's tiny solar cells, each a dot the size of a ballpoint pen tip, have been validated to convert 41 percent of solar energy to electricity, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory announced yesterday. Semprius is in the process of building a manufacturing facility in Henderson, N.C., to make concentrating solar arrays using its "micro-transfer printing" technique, according to the Department of Energy.

The semiconductor printing technique can be used for many applications, including improving … Read more

By storing solar energy in molten salt, BrightSource Energy can now build one less solar power plant.

The company said today that it is adding energy storage to three planned solar projects that will supply power to utility Southern California Edison.

Instead of building seven power plants to provide about 4 million megawatt-hours per year, BrightSource now expects to be able to meet that with six concentrating solar plants to be built over the next six years, including three that will have storage. It is now constructing its first project, the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, which will not have … Read more

Morgan Solar has brought on Canadian oil and gas distributor Enbridge as an investor to commercialize its concentrating-photovoltaic panels.

The Toronto-based company today said that Enbridge has invested $9.8 million as part of a $28.8 million round of funding.

Enbridge's primary business is oil and gas distribution but it has invested in a few solar energy projects that use traditional flat photovoltaic panels. Morgan Solar is the first solar technology it has invested in.

The money will be used to expand manufacturing capacity of Morgan Solar's concentrating-photovoltaic modules and trackers.

The company's core technology is … Read more

Talk about walking the walk when it comes to solar energy.

Concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) manufacturer Amonix has built a factory and office space that uses solar panels as the sole power source, the company announced Wednesday.

The 214,000 square-foot facility uses eight of the company's MegaModule CPV solar systems, to serve the entire power need for the production plant and some connected office space. The system supplies "100 percent of the North Las Vegas facility's energy needs," according to Amonix.

Of course, it should be noted that this plant is located in Nevada, an area … Read more

The Department of Energy has decided to invest $60 million over the next three years to develop and commercialize concentrated solar technology, Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced yesterday afternoon.

This investment comes out of the U.S. government's SunShot Initiative, a plan to reduce the cost of solar energy in the U.S. by 75 percent in order to make it more cost effective and competitive with other energy sources, according to Chu.

What is interesting about this particular funding is that the DOE seems to have listened to the critics of concentrated solar and gotten very specific about … Read more

Solar company Stirling Energy Systems has filed for bankruptcy, another casualty of a brutal global price war that is favoring commodity photovoltaic panels.

The Scottsdale, Arizona-based company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy late last week. The utility-scale solar company's largest investor is renewable energy developer NTR of Dublin, Ireland.

Founded in 1996, Stirling Energy Systems makes a large, 38-foot-high reflective dish which concentrates sunlight onto a Stirling engine to generate electricity. The 25-kilowatt SunCatcher dishes are designed to be used as building blocks for utility-scale solar farms in desert areas with sufficient sunlight.

After decades of development including a … Read more

Developers of the giant Blythe Solar Power Project in California have switched from solar thermal technology to photovoltaic solar panels, one of a string of similar changes at large-scale solar projects.

Solar Millennium today said that the first 500-megawatt phase of the Blythe plant will use photovoltaic (PV) panels because the economics work better.

The company earlier this year had received a conditional loan guarantee from the Department of Energy to develop a concentrating solar thermal plant, where heat from mirrored troughs makes steam that is passed through a turbine to generate electricity. But Germany-based Solar Millennium and its U.… Read more