Back to photostream

Solar Thermal Fashion

The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades

—Timbuk 3

 

Courtney peers into one of the heliostats of the BrightSource solar thermal facility in the Negev Desert of Israel.

 

Each of these flat mirrors aims the sun at a boiler tower, heating it to 1000°F to drive a steam generator, feeding electricity to the grid.

 

BrightSource believes that this will be the least expensive source of renewable energy and cost competitive with fossil fuels.

 

I just calculated that for their current projects in the U.S. alone, they will install 2 million of these mirrors… which will power 1.4 million homes… about 1.4 mirrors per home.

28,153 views
20 faves
27 comments
Uploaded on September 2, 2009
Taken on August 25, 2009