The World’s First 24/7 Thermosolar Power Plant

What you are seeing is not a scene out of a sci-fi movie, it is the world's first utility-scale commercial baseload solar power plant, located in the Spanish province Andalucia.  Torresol Energy, the company that built Gemasolar power plant is a joint venture between Spanish infrastructure giant Sener and Masdar – Abu Dhabi’s Future Energy Company.  

Gemasolar was officially launched in May 2011.  It is a 19.9-MW plant with a 15-hour ‘battery’, which can produce 110,000 MWh per year, equivelent to the energy consumption of 25,000 households. 

Gemasolar is not the world’s first commercial solar plant.  In fact there is another plant few hours from Gemasolar that has been operating with a 7.5-hour battery since July 2009.  However, Gemasolar can double the battery availability to 15 hours. The plant is capable of supplying energy 24hrs uninterrupted per day on most summer days, providing a higher annual capacity factor than most baseload plants such as nuclear power plants.

via Forbes and Torresol

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