An incredible sight has overtaken a field near Guazhou County in China's Gansu Province: almost 30,000 moving mirrors pointed at two huge central towers. This is China's new dual-tower solar thermal plant, Interesting Engineering reports.
Solar panels that convert sunlight into electricity are becoming a familiar sight all over the world. Solar thermal energy is a little different.
Instead of using solar panels, this new plant uses its thousands of mirrors — each reflecting up to 94% of the light that hits them — to focus a huge amount of sunlight onto the relatively small area of the towers, Interesting Engineering explains. That produces an incredible amount of heat — so much that similar solar-gathering methods can be used for smelting.
Like coal-fired and nuclear power plants, the solar thermal power plant uses the heat to turn water into steam. The rising steam then turns turbines, which generate electricity.
The solar thermal plant also contains a huge amount of molten salt, which stores heat like a battery stores electricity. When the sun is no longer out, the heat from the salt continues to make steam — meaning this is solar power that can run 24/7.
To maximize the amount of sunlight gathered, the mirrors around the towers move, tracking the sun across the sky. In the morning, most of the mirrors point at the eastern tower; in the afternoon, some switch to the western tower.
"The mirrors in the overlapping area can be utilized by either tower. This configuration is expected to enhance efficiency by 24%," plant project manager Wen Jianghong told China Global Television Network, per Interesting Engineering.
The design could even be expanded to add more towers and further improve efficiency, China claims.
According to CGTN, the Guazhou towers will be part of a complex of several clean energy plants, including wind, solar, and thermal, Interesting Engineering reports. Together, they're expected to produce 1.8 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity each year.
These methods of generating energy aren't just efficient and affordable; they also avoid polluting the air with toxic and heat-trapping chemicals. The complex will prevent about 1.7 million tons of carbon pollution, Interesting Engineering reports. This is in support of the Chinese government's stated goal to construct 1,200 gigawatts of less polluting energy capacity by 2030.
This isn't China's only solar tower, as it also recently broke ground on what is expected to be the world's largest solar tower by capacity.
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