Concerns as Solar Installations Join a Desert Ecosystem

[phantom power]

With seven large solar power plants already approved that would cover 42 square miles of the California desert with huge mirror arrays, solar dishes and towers, environmentalists and regulators have increasingly become concerned about the impact that industrialization of the desert will have on fragile landscapes.

“If wildlife issues are not at the top of a developer’s list, they should be,” said Karen Douglas, the chairwoman of the California Energy Commission, which licenses large solar thermal power plants. “The footprint of these solar projects is unprecedented, and obviously they can impact a range of species.”

Developers underestimate the importance of desert animals at their peril.

The California Energy Commission in October, for instance, approved Tessera Solar’s huge Calico project in Southern California only after the company agreed to slash the project nearly in half to avoid having to relocate most of the 104 tortoises found on the site this year. And the commission’s staff has indicated that it is unlikely to recommend the licensing of Solar Millennium’s 250-megawatt Ridgecrest power plant because of its impact on the desert tortoise and the Mohave ground squirrel.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/17/business/energy-environment/17WILD.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

[FBaggins]

1. Environmentalists have become concerned?

That can't be. All environmentalists agree 100% with how we should protect the earth. These must be rightwingers posing as environmentalists.

Why would you post this obvious pro-nuke article?

[Confusious]

3. The Sierra club is a bunch of Republicans?

"The energy commission in September licensed Ivanpah over the objections of the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity and other groups that argued it would eliminate high-quality habitat for the tortoise."

Wow! They had me fooled. :sarcasm:

I guess all environmentalists don't agree 100% with how we should protect the earth.
That Persona non grata list is gonna grow.

I also don't see how it's pro nuke. It just talks about the problems building the plant.

[FBaggins]

5. Don't see how it's pro nuke? How naive.

Anything that questions the construction of a new wind or solar plant is by definition pro-nuke.

Sheesh!

[NNadir]

4. The anti-nukes describing themselves as "environmentalists" is typical of their

delusional approach to, well, everything.

Anyone who calls himself or herself an "environmentalist" while declaring the world's largest, by far, source of climate change to be evil, while hyping a gas industry front that produces insignifican energy while representing a land use disaster is, um, out to lunch.

The funding sources of anti-nukes are not hidden. They are publicly available for anyone to look at.

BP solar worked out just great. My coating the Gulf of Mexico with dark matter, they were able to achieve a great solar thermal success.

Heckuva job.

[XemaSab]

2. Interesting

n/t

[StarsInHerHair]

6. I'd prefer solar panel 'trees' in parking lots & even over sections

of city streets. I've seen the parking lot solar panels on JetsonGreen's twitter. I think they'll have to be more creative in placing solar panels, like on the rooftops of skyscrapers, on the sides of tall buildings-mostly south facing sides. Eco-sprawl isn't the answer, imho.

[joshcryer]

7. I actually like the idea of converting deserts into nice life-friendly oasises.

Lots of solar thermal plants can theoretically reduce the heat which reaches the grown totally, and then you can plant stuff between the solar panels, and animals can live in the shad. I know, bizarre craziness I'm spouting, but you're effectively removing heat from the environment and making it do useful work.

[XemaSab]

8. What's the albedo coming off of solar panels?

:shrug:

[joshcryer]

9. I'm thinking CSP which would technically be reflective.

I'm not a very big fan of PV for the various complexities needed to make it work (see: chemicals). Big CSP farms can be made quick and cheaply, imho. Silicon and aluminum, the two most needed materials for mirrors and are two of the most abundant elements on the planet.

Note that albedo is only an issue when light is absorbed and remitted as IR, CSP doesn't have that problem because while it does become emitted as IR at the collector, at least 35-45% of it is converted into energy. Yes, a desert covered in (edit!: reflective) solar collectors is going to be cooler!

[joshcryer]

10. To clarify something:

Obviously there's not less heat entering the environment, but 35-40% of that heat would be going to make electricity, it would be remitted elsewhere, possibly hundreds of miles away, as friction heat in motors or heating elements or in refrigerators, etc. You've effectively removed the heat from the desert environment, but it's still there.

The point being that albedo doesn't play in to this at all, since these reflectors are negative albedo even though we're still trying our best to concentrate as much of the light into one spot. There's also the point that if these reflectors are coated with something they'll have some refraction, which will result in a reflection off of them away from the sun (seeing a big 10 square mile plant from space would be awesome, especially if you pass through the reflection light). Given the environment you will probably want the aluminum to be second surface, just for durability.

It's not like PV panels that convert 20% of the energy hitting them into electricity, and, being darker colored, absorbing more light from the sun than otherwise would've been absorbed.