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Queensland the “sunshine state” and now they are focused on digging up more coal.
Can’t believe that a special project like Solar Dawn a leader to showcase for others are not supported by QLD government….how short sighted is that!
QLD Gov should come to their senses soon, before they are left in the coal dust so to speak.
I hope this special project will go ahead despite the lack of QLD government support, this very important project must get off the ground and running.
What will happen with this project now that the state govt has pulled funding?
Please find detailed below an update on the proposed Solar Dawn Power Plant:
The Solar Dawn Consortium today confirmed that it has advised the Commonwealth Government that while the project is well-advanced and remains Australia’s best prospect for a large-scale solar thermal project, the Consortium did not meet the recent financial close milestone and the Queensland Government has formally withdrawn from the current project support agreement.
Project Director Anthony Wiseman said that while the project delay is a set-back, the Consortium will pursue discussions with the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) and the Queensland Government to move Solar Dawn forward based on the project’s advanced status and the strong economic and environmental benefits it offers to the state and the country.
“Solar Dawn is well-positioned to bring large-scale solar power to the forefront of energy production in Australia and help realise Queensland’s potential as a world-leading producer of more efficient, reliable and renewable energy,” Mr Wiseman said.
“It represents a $1.5 billion economic investment in Queensland, delivering 300 construction jobs, local manufacturing and a $68 million solar research program for The University of Queensland,” he added.
The Consortium reported significant progress in other areas of the project with Development Approvals received from the Western Downs Regional Council for the power plant site and assembly facility and the contract finalised with The University of Queensland for the research and development program.
“Solar Dawn is offering something incredibly promising – benefits previously not available within the Australian renewable energy industry. There are various options to move Solar Dawn forward, and we are committed to making the project successful,” Mr Wiseman said.
Solar Dawn has already resulted in significant skills development in Queensland through the development phase, which sees local Queensland companies now offering services around Australia and overseas. This sees new jobs in a new industry, further diversifying Queensland service industries.
The project is a great initiative and tremendous support within the community and will become an icon for energy generation in Queensland, Australia and the region.
Powered by sun- a real great project! In Austria we have now near 65% of our electric energy from renewables.
The results are real positive: new working places and independance. Economical and ecological – something which fits together! I have seen a solar thermal power project also in Spain, and there where also same positive effects with working places powered by the sun. The sun costs no money, prices of oil and natural gas are each year higher and higher. Renewable energy is the best option for the future, for a clean world, everywhere- in Austria and also in Australia. So I am looking to Australia now, because we have to look to the future of our children everywhere- in Europe and also in Australia.
Best regards from Austria
Doris Holler-Bruckner
editor in chief
OEKONEWS http://www.oekonews.at
Dear Ladies and Gentleman,
I wish in Germany we had the sun intensity like you in Australia, that we can install a few solar power plants like the Solar Dawn Project.
In Europe we have two power plants like that in Spain, and they are doing fine – power from the sun hours after sun set, that is great and perfect.
If mankind does not change to low carbon way of living – we can do that without reducing our standard of living – there will be no future.
What will we say to our children and as grandfather or mother to their children, why we didn´t try hard to change our way of producing energy.
The technolgy is there and we know enough about the reason why we have to change.
Let´s do it – make the Solar Dawn Project become real.
U.Werges
Germany
EV-Driver
e-mail u.werges@bsm-ev.de
eFax +49 322 23 73 9801
To the new Queensland Government:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
As a pioneer with renewable energies since the oil crises of 1973/74, I was very glad about the solar policy that Australia adopted with Solar Flagships. I was shocked that with change of government in Queensland, that one of the most important, most efficient and most innovative solar projects – and a gate to the sustainable energy production and many 1000s of qualified jobs – may be at risk if the Government withdraws its funding.
As you may know, the German law of renewable energies is based on the protection of confidence during the contract period. This law enabled more than 200.000 qualified jobs within the renewable energy sector – exceeding 50% more jobs than within the coal, atomic energy and oil sectors.
Therefore the Solar Dawn project has to be realised, as an investment in Australia’s interest and as an investment in the global interest, as the world moves towards low carbon power generation.
Respectfully
Luc Perraudin
certified project-, quality- and service-manager (ITIL V3)
D-Hannover, Germany
I’m wondering when Australian government will understand how important renewable energies are. Economical and ecological there is no way around them. In Germany we have achieved a big step. 20% renewable share in electricity production within 15 years. Denying the needs of clean and sustainable energy seems unfortunately a political instrument in Australia and is undermining the peoples activities who are putting lots of there time and money in the establishment of an energy supply which will keep Australia beautiful and enjoyable for our grand children.
The signs of global warming are so evident, floods in Queensland, record temperatures in WA, no summer in NSW…wake up!
Regards from Germany…thomas+
Using fossil fuels cause climate change. Using renewable energy doesn’t. It’s a no brainer, we need as much funding as possible to go into Solar Dawn and other similar projects.
What an amazing project, if we can only get it off the ground! We have an abundance of beautiful, FREE sunshine that is available in plentiful supply in Queensland and Australia. That we are not maximising our capacity to harness its energy when we have so much sunshine is simply embarrassing. This initiative will promote a sustainable future for Australia. This makes good sense for the economy, the environment and our health as a nation.
Isn’t this the sunshine state?
How I would love to see some progressive investment in base load solar instead of the usual race to dig more coal faster. Time for some of our pollies need to show some leadership and integrity.
I fully support the Solar Dawn project as an extremely important initiative both for Queensland and Australia. Renewable energy is the way of the future and unfortunately Australia seems to be unwilling to take any real steps forward.
The Solar Dawn project must go ahead as it will mean positives in so many areas – addressing climate change, reducing power costs, investing in renewable energy, creating jobs to name a few.
What a frighteningly lack of foresight to can a project that is likely to save not only money, but also jobs and the environment from further damage, just to score political points. I really hope that common sense wins over political sense. Please keep solar dawn alive. We are after all the Sunshine state. And sunshine is free. Let us utilize that to the fullest and be the market leaders. Everyone will be a winner.
As a lifelong Queensland resident and energy research scientist, I am deeply dismayed to hear of the new government’s move to ditch this project. There is so much potential in this state to play a proactive role in transitioning the world to a sustainable system that works and will continue to work for future generations. We have a moral imperative to do what we can and we need government at every level to be as proactive as possible. I strongly hope that the government will rethink it’s plans around this project and restore full financial support!
Solar thermal is a low tech, proven technology that should be given the highest priority. Not to mention the construction benefits you get from such infrastructure.
Lets have it and right now.
YES you are RIGHT!
solar thermal is a proven technology. The question you should be asking is why isn’t it be build? Not just in Austraila, but around the world?
Generator work best about 85% capacity and hate fluctations. Then the sun goes down or there is clouds the solar thermal energy drops off, even seasonal. But the bigest problem is what to do when there is too much thermal energy. Do we covert it to kinetic energy (spin the turbins) and then electrical energy? who can they sell it too? you?
you used a good word “Infrastructure” but we need a national approach not only how we use energy, but WHY!
Dominic
Solar Energy is the energy of the future. Solar Thermal energy is part of the real sustainable and logical answer. There are a few other sources of energy that will complement energy from the sun, such as wind, geothermal, tidal, hydro…
Australian political leaders have to be courageous and support projects like Solar Dawn. In fact we have and we can power Australia with solar energy, combined with trigeneration and other clean sources.
We can mine and sell minerals to the rest of the world but we have to stop exporting and burning fossil fuels. Gas, coal and oil are extremely bad for the environment as such pollution levels and this is now well understood by our best world academies of science.
There is a strong case for solar energy in regards to economics, job creation, technology advancements and more importantly transiting quickly top a zero carbon future / mitigating global warming.
This is not a game, this is not a matter of opinion or belief anymore, this is a reality and a matter of physics and ecology. Political leaders have to make the tough decisions, make the logical choice, develop large scale solar energy projects and smaller residential and commercial solar installations.
Regards to all,
Julien Lacave
Australia needs more experience in solar thermal power stations. Lets learn from Solar Dawn
We need solar for two reasons: First and foremost, knowingly and deliberately polluting is morally and ethically unacceptable under any circumstance. The economy is not a justification that makes it right, it is the one of the reasons why we must change.
Secondly, Australia has the sun and space, and yet it is countries like Sweden that lead in solar tech. We have already missed our opportunity to be global leaders in this field. It is our obligation to ensure that the infrastructure that we build today is going to be of value to future generations, not a liability imposed on them. This project will be a fantastic asset and will spawn growth in the direction that we most need it: Carbon Neutral.
Big Solar, it can only benefit the state, in jobs and cleaner power for the future.
We need more of these not less.
Regards
Peter Smee
Building concentrated solar thermal infrastructure in Australia makes complete sense. It is working in others countries around the world, & we are the sunniest continent on earth-the ideal place for solar thermal to become a major source of energy to power our homes & cities, for generations & generations to come. Renewable energy is the way of the future. Let’s get with the times & get it happening! Now.
If you want your children and your grandchildren to have a future, then support the environment. Support Solar. This is the 21st century, it’s time for a change.
I support the Solar Dawn Project. I also support the Greens (at least we can rely on them to make change).
I CANNOT understand it. It doesn’t matter which side of politics you barrack for or whether you think alternative energy sources can do the full job or not, Australia clearly needs some alternative forms of energy generation. Solar? Hey it’s Queensland – the sunshine state! What kind of nutcase pulls a project that’s already been committed to – the hard negotiating yards have already been made…It doesn’t make sense……UNLESS Big Oil has some sort of hold over this ld government????
I agree with Dan Cass’s comment (April 2nd) – Australia could – and SHOULD be a superpower for solar energy. The economics will follow and future generations will kick themselves for fumbling around on getting projects like Solar Dawn established.
I also think this project will have an enormous international impact. The superpowers of Asia, China in particular, will dominate the worlds energy usage for at least the remainder of this century. They are closely looking at trends & models of innovation and this will be in their face.
What’s wrong with Campbell Newman was it the petrol coal and gas companies that helped him win the election it must have been if he wants to scrap this very important project
because they would be the only people in this place we call earth that wouldn’t want it.
Come on Queensland, get into this century and catch up with the rest of Australia on renewable generation. How are you going to deal with global warming – curse that sunshine of yours or cash in on it? The time to decide and invest is now.
I understand that large scale solar projects will be cost competitive in the 2020s and that the best current renewable energy investment is wind and roof-top photovoltaic panels. I think this is one reason why the large scale solar projects are not proceeding. The cost is too high and too centralised. It would be more cost-effetcive in the enxt five years to encourage the technologies which are already delivering renewable energy on a distributed and therefore more diverse basis.
Thanks for your comment Ross.
Solar technologies (both solar PV and solar thermal) are evolving and developing very quickly. Implementation of these technologies at scale drives it down the costs curve and up the learning curve. And with solar thermal in particular, there is the prospect of large scale energy storage and of hybridisation with other thermal fuel sources, which makes it more “dispatchable” onto the grid than wind energy or conventional domestic scale solar PV.
The proposed Solar Dawn project will include a substantial research program (http://solardawn.com.au/about/research/), headed by the University of Queensland, which will investigate areas which will assist with the implementation and early operation of this particular project, but will also be of benefit to solar thermal technology generally.
Solar Dawn team
Dear Mr Newman,
Queensland is making a lot of money from coal. Fast forward to when China and Japan stop buying out coal. What will we have to show for the coal boom days – apart from gaping holes in the ground? Wouldn’t it be great if we had used some of that money to, at least, start the transition to renewable energy economy – and Solar Dawn is a great place to start. Please don’t kill the Solar Dawn project.
Sincerely
Bill Gresham
Darwin knew it, and many of us know it.
In diversity is strength. Queensland is relying very heavily on income from coal, and it would be a wasted opportunity not to invest some of this wealth on our large renewable resource (solar), as well as the intellectual and human resources we have at our disposal, to create a new future for ourselves.
We missed the opportunity with the first oil crisis in the 1970s, and are paying dearly for it with Climate Change – this time we cannot afford to delay longer. Impacts will grow in severity even if we stop emitting now, as there is inertia in our natural systems (as in our political ones – LOL). Do we wait until the effects are so pronounced that it will be both very costly and difficult to turn it around? Or do we act now to reduce the pain?
The decision (and consequences) are ours.
Nick
It is critical that the QLD government continues to look towards the future and start to support large scale investments such as this project so that we can ensure that the pressure that we place on the planet is reduced. At the same time attracting investment, creating value, becoming more skilled in an industry that is taking hold globally, making jobs, and staying modern.
We didn’t leave the stone age because we ran out of rocks – let’s leave the coal age and embrace the clean energy age!
Have a look at this great video about electric cars and the way we produce our electricity in Australia to put projects like this on e into context.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km5GeqRBWl8
This is a step in the right direction. Large scale solar has great potential in Australia. I hope governments across Australia can find a way to get behind projects like this with their full support. We are heading into an era of diminishing energy resources and Australia is well positioned to diversify and take full advantages of the readily available renewable sources of energy. Queensland can be proud to be a pioneer for large-scale solar energy projects.
I was so proud of Australia when I heard about the solardawn project, a renewable power power plant at the right scale, at the right place, at the right time, to become a role model and to lead the world on its way to get away from fossil fuels! We do not only need role models and pioneers, but we also need hi-tech solar technology that can be exported, thereby enabling profits to stay in Australia. Solardawn is offering all this and it would be a mistake not to fully financially and politically support it.
Louis Palmer, Switzerland
Solar pioneer and first man who ever travelled around the world on solar power: http://www.solartaxi.com
“Champion of the Earth 2011”, awarded by
United Nations Environment Programm
I think it makes sense to harness natural resources in a proactive and constructive manner. Lets face it, we need solar, so think even bigger guys and go for it!
Natasha
As I see it, here is an opportunity for humans to draw on natures ‘available energy (the sun)’, to produce the power we humans require to live. Best of all it will be done without depleting the planet of its natural resources. As far as I can tell this is a very wise move for ‘man’ to do something positive for not only Queensland but for our planet.
LNP talk about change, thats what got them elected. The solar dawn plant, is change. Its Queenslands chance to show commitment to a project which reflects the state, the sunshine state, the smart state. Surely Campbell Newman is willing to take a punt and lead the other states in the development of solar technologies. Lets not waste this opportunity to take a small step in the right direction towards change. Power from the sun. Surely its worth a go…
If the government is serious about it’s Clean Energy Future Plan than the Solar Dawn project is a step in the right direction and a project worthy of funding.
I hope that Solar Dawn goes ahead as planned – it is a very exciting project that will be a step in the right R&D direction and an excellent asset for us here in Queensland. Over the next few decades as we adjust the way we produce and distribute energy we will rely upon new technologies and the only way we will have those new technologies is to take action in the field. Some lessons cannot be learned in the laboratory.
Good luck guys.
Cheers,
Forbes.
I worked on the design and construction of the prototype CLFR collector at Liddell Power Station in the Hunter Valley and it was evident at that time that the coal miners were unrelenting in their hostility towards that project since it was plain to everybody involved that this technology is a cheap means of greatly reducing coal consumption and carbon dioxide emissions even from existing coal fired power stations – like Kogan Creek.
Although Campbell Newman has threatened and probably will withdraw the $75 million that the previous Queensland government had promised, in a project with a total cost of around $1200 million, that relatively small sum should not be a show stopper.
Surely the company and the Federal Government could make up the difference and ensure that this vital project proceeds.
The recent reports of a climate change tipping point being reached in the Arctic Ocean should be all the encouragement that is needed.
Look, I have no problem with coal-fired power stations, or nuclear, even oil shale, because as far as I’m concerned, there is no science behind the concept of human-induced climate change and the associated drive to seek renewable alternatives; having said that, if the world is going to convince itself that we need to cut CO2 emissions, then, as the major first world economy in lower latitudes, Australia should position itself as a technology leader to take advantage of this.
It also makes political sense to me, for one of the greatest coal sources in the world to lead the push into wholesale solar power development. And, as I understand it, the project will provide a beneficial use of some treated coal seam gas water.
Plus, we’ll never make these things economic if we don’t bite the bullet sooner or later and get cracking on the all-important technical development R&D.
I say, go for it – after all, the money committed by the Queensland government is petty cash given the Queensland budget total which I think is around $2bn.
We live in the State that claims to be the ‘Sunshine State,’ we don’t need north-west Queensland to be put on the map as region of dirty coal mines. Solar thermal can support our economy, and has little environmental impact whilst creating new jobs, after all….it is our environment that the economy has been thriving on.
Let’s think of our future!
Having read about proposed changes under our new Qld Government, I am trying to increase my understanding re solar energy capture in Qld and so looked at your website.
Like many in Qld, I read LNP’s policies during recent weeks to keep atop of changes likely to happen in my state in the near future. This is where I am perplexed however: Why would LNP announce a retraction of funding for Solar Dawn when The LNP pledge under Qld Government “will establish Queensland’s Resources and Energy sector as a world leader once more and get Queensland back on track with a real plan for our State’s future”? The LNP pledge includes:
(i) Building infrastructure that is essential to the future growth of the resource and energy sector;
(ii) Developing clean energy, alternative and renewable technologies and fuels, while ensuring coal fired electricity can remain competitive and viable.
(iii) Demanding World’s best practice in social and environmental performance.
Solar Dawn was reported by media to have won a highly competitive project bidding process, and therefore is well researched and positioned to address the LNP resource objectives listed above. Have I missed something?
I am hopeful that Qld Government’s decision is still under consideration while the new LNP Government forms its strategies. I have contacted Qld Government to provide background re its decision, and will keep an eye on your website for updates. The politicisation of the resources issue in Qld is a regular topic in state and national papers, and it seems the almighty opinion page is the new powerful direction-stick.
I hope that your project is successful – with the recent ‘mining boom’ underway in Qld, we are well positioned in Qld to be innovators in other areas of the resource sector. Lets hope that your project receives continued support by Qld Government and is not unfairly used as ‘media hype’ to demonstrate change in Ideology.
Australia could be a solar energy superpower, because we have the best solar resources in the world plus a skilled workforce and world-leading research.
Queensland deserves better than having a stop-start approach to its solar industries.
Here’s my thoughts about the innovative, effective solar industry policies of the US administration, and what Queensland should be aiming for – http://goo.gl/6Qcuf
Australia needs more innovative research and development projects, such as Solar Dawn, to diversify our resource-based economy. 450 jobs in regional Queensland will provide a significant boost to the local economy. Queensland needs this project and the Earth as whole needs it too – we have so much sun in Australia, it makes perfect sense to use this clean source of energy (rather than burning dirty coal)!
I would be bitterly disappointed if the new Queensland government decided not to fund this exciting initiative. Yes the state needs to tighten the purse strings but at what cost to the future of all Australians. I will not stand by and quietly watch this project fall by the wayside. Support Solar Dawn!
Projects such as Solar Dawn are essential for the development of the large scale solar industry in Queensland and Australia. The carbon tax is far from adequate as Australia’s sole response to climate change as some purport. Further politicising the renewable energy industry will only further disenchant voters who are tired of politicking and the terrible waste of time and resources for state and commonwealth government and industry that this leads to. The Solar Dawn project has significant benefits to Queensland and it would be refreshing to see some common sense from the new Qld government in providing full support to the project.
I was very excited to hear of a large scale solar project for Australia – it’s about time we were leading the world in this area! Scrapping this project will not only be a major loss to the progress of renewable energy in this country, it will be an embarassment. The rest of the world should be looking to Australia for solar initiatives, and from all accounts this is a world class project to show-case. Australia needs this project!
This project must be worth much more to Queensland if it went ahead than if it was stopped! All the direct and indirect jobs, manufacturing, leading edge research, taxes and duties, rates, and the kudos!
Isn’t Queensland meant to be the smart state?
This is a project that would be looked upon for generations to come as the turning point in Australia’s renewable, sustainable and leader of technologies future! Have some vision Queensland, what an opportunity you are being given!
Solar Dawn is a superb initiative to lift solar projects to a whole new level in Australia. We need a mix of wind, solar, hydroelectric and other sustainable energy options – diversified energy – into the future, rather than relying on spewing coal into the atmosphere, at massively increasing costs to the consumer and to the environment per year.
Coal is certainly the mainstay of energy today, and will be for a little while yet, but over time we need to decrease our dependence on what is a dirty and unsustainable energy, in favour of clean, renewable, sustainable energy sources. It’s all a matter of when rather than if, and I believe Solar Dawn – and other projects like it – is one of the projects that marks a line in the sand and says “the time is right, right now”.
It was very saddening to hear that this project is presently under threat, and absolutely implore Campbell Newman (who has hitherto had an excellent track record on sustainable energy projects) to ensure that it goes through. It will inject much needed cash into a largescale project located in rural Australia, where investment is needed. It will assist in creating jobs for Queenslanders, and it will catapult Queensland onto the sustainable energy map in this country, and beyond.
Keep up the good work Solar Dawn team, your project is inspiring.
Peter
Interesting how few comments have appeared here.
What intrigues me is that nowhere can I find any statement about what happens at night! I presume the sun sets in Queensland.
Newman is correct in stopping this project. Had it employed molten salt, liquified by the sun’s heat, to store that heat and release it in a controlled manner via a heat exchanger to generate steam, then it’s continuance could possibly be justified.
Thanks Peter. We only added this comments page yesterday.
Solar Dawn is a solar peaking plant. Whilst it is designed to function during sunlight hours, it is also designed to be fitted in future with a gas boiler backup system, to enable it to generate after the sun has gone down – primarily into hot summer evenings when electricity demand from air conditioners is at its highest.
The incorporation of large volume energy storage is one of the greatest potential benefits of solar thermal power plants, or alternatively, the hybridisation of solar thermal with conventional fossil fuel generation. The generation is then “dispatchable” for grid operators, and of greater network value than a solar plant without storage or hybridisation.
Energy storage needs to work commercially though, primarily through high enough night time power pricing. That is not the currently case in Australia, so we won’t be incorporating energy storage into the Solar Dawn plant. Energy storage is, however, a key part of the $60m research program which is part of the Solar Dawn Project.
Solar Dawn team
But there in lies the problem. You are proposing to build a non- commercial plant which in its initial stages can only supply a variable output over a specific time period which does not match consumption patterns. The hybrid solar/gas plant is at least approaching a base load generating facility, which must be built if you hope to supplant conventional coal powered plants.
I know You will know that solar power, in the absence of heat storage or a hybrid arrangement can never be a reliable source of base load let alone peak load. And for a reliable system of supply the capacity to meet both requirements must be engineered into the system. Otherwise supply failure, restrictions or brown-outs will be an inevitable consequence.
Your technology is not experimental. It is already proven and it’s limitations are well known. I really do struggle with the concept of subsidizing a so-called ‘green energy future’ anyway as it inevitably leads to proposals such as this as companies milk the ‘hollow log’. I don’t blame ‘Solar Dawn’ for this – you are a symptom of bad policy.
If you were building a commercial hybrid plant from the start, without the injection from the hollow log I would be much more supportive, But good luck anyway.
Peter S,, there seems to be a view around that the CLFR used in Solar Dawn is not innovative technology. Incorrect. The CLFR uses lower cost steam generation in the field rather than the oil in parabolic storage plants, and was able to win the Solar Dawn tender because of that.
Steam generation in a linear field is a new technology area. Storage has not been commercialised for it yet, as it has with older oil circulation parabolic trough plants. But the technology anyway needs to be developed with a fuel backup because normally storage plants need some fuel backup for unusual poor solar conditions. The backup percentage in Solar Dawn is much lower than the old hybrid SEGS plants in California but even these 25 year old plants are highly valued by the Californian utility sector because of peak load flattening.
In Queensland, night-time electricity prices are low and reflect an oversupply of coal generation – we do not need more baseload. The Auses papers by myself any my colleagues for the USA and Diesendorf and Elliston for Australia show calculated total electricity systems are feasible without any baseload. These will need solar storage, but wholesale solar storage at the right price. Ultimately the field cost is the most important in the long run. Solar Dawn demonstrates a low cost field.
The Solar Dawn team note that the CLFR research program includes storage, but this needs new technology. Storage from a linear solar steam plant cannot use present molten salt technology, which is based upon circulation of a single phase fluid (oil) from the solar field with heat transfer to another in the storage (molten salt). Steam generation is more complex thermodynamically, having liquid, steam and superheat modes that must each be handled by the storage. But I am confident that it will be done, and the payoff will be a cheaper field with cheaper power.
If your objection is to the cost of new development, then the parabolic troughs with storage common in Spain at very high subsidy levels had their chance in this tender, and were clearly even more expensive, because the extra capital outlay required to pick up night generation load is not repaid by the very low night-time wholesale prices in Australia.
But I think this is a mean-spirited sort of objection for Australians to make. Spain is not a rich country. Australia is. The Federal government would be aware that a rich country like Australia (second highest average per capita wealth in the world of major countries after Switzerland according to the Credit Suisse) should be doing its share in solar industrial development (as opposed to solar research where it has done extremely well). Solar Dawn is such a development and, as stated by the Solar Dawn team, new technology research is already underway in storage. Some proportion of mining and coal profits should be going to development of such needed new technology. Queensland benefits greatly from such mining revenue.
I have often advocated market-based FIT or income tax rebate structural reforms for solar technology, but Mr. Ferguson objects to this approach for reasons which are not known to me. But Solar Dawn is a step forward, demonstrating integration of a new technology with the grid at a lower cost point than other solar thermal electric technologies and more flexibly than non-storage PV on the grid.
I should point out here that we have 6.7 kW of domestic PV and will eventually use this with a lithium battery system to maximise internal usage in high cost periods, peak-lopping our share of the grid load. PV is beginning to make sense for ordinary citizens at the retail offset level.
However, there is not nearly enough roof area to support our entire electricity sector with PV + lithium battery storage. We need large-scale wholesale solar and wind as well. The wholesale market needs load matching flexibility and a much lower energy price. Wind does not have storage. PV is not there yet technically because battery storage is currently too expensive (it might be some day). This is a good time to bring the third leg of the new generation system (solar thermal + advanced storage + fuel backup insurance) up to speed. If built, Solar Dawn will be a valued part of the Queensland generation system for the future – just as the Californian SEGS plants are now – and perhaps for much longer as improvements are incorporated with maintenance. It will operate best during air-conditioning load peaks as in California.
Any addition of storage to Solar Dawn itself is not planned to my knowledge, but could be added if it made economic sense in the future. The development of low cost solar field technology is the most urgent matter, because this defines the fluids used for heat transfer and what kind of storage technology is required for the future.
Solar Dawn is not baseload solar for a very simple reason: there isn’t the commercial case for baseload renewable in Australia (yet).
There is, however, a strong case for PEAKING solar power plants. Very simple reason: they can sell power at market rates of $1000/MWh and above, which are available during daytime. Check out AEMO’s website for Queensland’s historical power prices.
Whereas night-time power prices are something like $30/MWh – well below cost price for solar (or wind or gas, for that matter).
So, for a given amount of capital it makes the most amount of financial sense to spend that capital on PEAKING power, and not to spend a dollar on baseload capacity, since you will make no returns off the money you invest in thermal storage.
This is analogous to other new technologies – like automobiles, cell phones or aircraft. Their entrance into the consumer market was always initially at the top end – i.e. making money of the part of the market that could afford it. After getting a market toehold, they then expanded and used economies of scale in order to grow their market share (thanks to Henry Ford, jet engines, etc).
Solar thermal has great potential and I’m excited about Solar Dawn. Great to see an Aussie technology hit the ground running.
We need big solar projects, especially in the sunshine state! I hope it happens and is the first of many.
I am very excited about your project and commend you on your work. I have just emailed the new State Energy Minister to request he provide the promised funding for this project.
I wanted to subscribe for updates but there was no input for email address. Are you planning on posting info? Surely an email would be more suitable?
Thanks,
Dane Amoore.
Thanks Dane.
You can subscribe for email updates here: http://solardawn.com.au/subscribe/
Solar Dawn team
I voted for Campbell Newman because I admired what he did at Brisbane City Council – particularly the renewable energy initiative. I’d be mightily disappointed if he ditches this solar project. Queensland needs it!