Australia has a fairly heavy reliance on coal power for our electricity supply, despite having plenty of open space and lots of sunshine. Which makes the announcement from Queensland coal power station CS Energy that they’ll be installing 44 megawatts worth of solar energy a promising step forward for the Australian energy industry.
The $104.7 million project will be located on 30 hectares in Queensland, and should be completed by 2013. Funding from the project will come from a variety of sources, with the Federal and Queensland governments both chipping in substantial amounts to make the project happen.
The solar energy isn’t going to be funnelled out to Queenslanders homes though – instead, it will be used to supplement the coal energy, making the plant significantly more efficient and reducing the amount of CO2 emissions. According to CS Energy CEO David Brown:
“By using energy from the sun with Areva’s solar booster application, we will make the coal-fired plant more fuel efficient and reduce its greenhouse intensity – avoiding the production of 35,600 tons of greenhouse gas emissions annually.”
[CNet]
Adrian Cascun-Valencic
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 1:24 PMSolar is currently useless for baseload power, but supplementing existing systems is one good use for it. Presumably this installation will mean the plant can place less load on their turbines, meaning they can maintain optimum speed with less fuel input during the day.
The one issue is that it’s PV, which AFAIK is still horribly inefficient and (environmentally) expensive to make. I wonder where the panels actually came from – ::10bux:: says they’re sourced from a Chinese manufacturer with zero pollution accountability.
hugh
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 1:38 PMis the solar power going to make heat to burn the coal better? if so why didnt they build a solar condenser with mirrors would that be cheaper? or why not build a solar condenser and use it to heat the boiler in the coal fire station then turn off the coal
Stephen Bain
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 2:21 PMIt’s not going to be PV, it’s going to be solar steam. See the picture in the article rather than the picture here on Giz.
The steam will be funnelled right into the existing generator. They’ll be able to tune the operation of the coal furnace for maximum efficiency, rather than having to ramp output up and down to meet the demanded output.
Jack Dalrymple
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 2:22 PMi could see solar being used to assist coal plants. i know at hazlewood power they’re almost perpetually down one or two units and the building itself is freaking huge. covering it in solar panels would be a pretty sweet way to assist power production.
Mike W
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 4:16 PMSo assuming a payback over 10 years, this improvement costs over $200 per tonne of CO2 reduction. Seems bloody expensive if you ask me.
Mat
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 5:56 PMTrue, but what about the additional $ saving through increased efficiency of the plant, savings in coal etc.
Jason H
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 8:54 PMSurely we can’t just put off doing things to improve/reduce the issue on the basis that it is expensive.
If the environment was your car and you chose to not service it, drive it hard and not change the brakes or the oil for 4 years. Logic would suggest that when you do come to repair or service it that it will be significantly more expensive than if you had dealt with the issues on a more frequent basis.
Maybe we have been duped into believing that we can continue to externalise costs indefinitely and not have expensive consequences to deal with later on down the line.
Mark
Thursday, April 14, 2011 at 7:52 PMActually, the system just pre-heats the water. It is still steamed by good old Queensland black coal as per normal, but pre-heating it with solar means that you don’t need to burn as much coal, to give plant ‘an effective’ 44 megawatt boost. Still pretty damned smart cookies, and a nice way to tackle the baseload power issue.
olearymo
Friday, April 15, 2011 at 8:57 AMAs part of the launch ceremony, the boys placed a severed head in the middle of the solar panels.
Ahh, tradition.
TK
Friday, April 15, 2011 at 2:17 PMThey’re trying to get ahead in the industry…