Massive Solar Plant In the Sahara Could Help Keep the EU Powered (digitaltrends.com) 257
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Digital Trends: In the global race to ditch fossil fuel reliance for more renewable energy sources, Europe is already making some impressive strides. That is likely to ramp up considerably thanks to a new European Union plan to build a large solar plant in the Sahara desert -- with the ability to generate enough power to keep much of Europe juiced up. In all, the enormous solar farm aims to produce 4.5 gigawatts of power, which can then be transmitted across the Mediterranean from Tunisia to mainland Europe. TuNur's proposed solar farm utilizes an enormous quantity of mirrors to reflect sunlight onto a central collector, which uses molten salt to store the energy as heat. Three HVDC submarine cables will then transport the power to Europe. The first cable will link Tunisia and Malta, the second will link Tunisia to central Italy, and a third will link Tunisia to the south of France. "We are opening a new energy corridor to allow Europe to import cheap solar power from the Sahara on a massive scale," Daniel Rich, Chief Operating Officer of TuNur, the company behind the project, told Digital Trends. "This will help Europe meet its Paris Climate Agreement emissions reduction commitments quickly and cost effectively. It also will give a much-needed boost to the Tunisia economy through significant investment into the country, creation of thousands of jobs, new tax revenues, and the establishment of a new solar industry that can help support their future domestic demand."
4.5GW not that much (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: 4.5GW not that much (Score:4, Insightful)
You have to start somewhere
Terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
So hell!
Lets make our power dependent on one huge collection of transmission lines that can be taken down with one well placed bomb.
And lets place that in one of the most war torn regions in the world.
That will work out just great.
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Re:Slowdown global warming? (Score:4, Informative)
And this will help deter global warming how?
The alternative is to release heat stored in the chemical bonds of fossils and release greenhouse gases into the atmosphere which trap more heat.
Either way, you are releasing/retaining 4.5 GW of energy. The difference with solar is that you avoid a greenhouse effect which traps even more heat.
Remember that this sunlight has already reached the Earth's surface and is therefore part of our normal energy input from the Sun. The 4.5 GW absorbed by the solar array will radiate out eventually, just as it would naturally. The only difference is that it will do some useful work first---and it will radiate out from Europe instead of Africa.
Re:Terrorism (Score:5, Informative)
So terrorists now have submarines? You do realize that the lines are underwater, don't you? Only the stations are aboveground. And there's three of them. Very large structures containing row after row of AC-DC converters, not just "one bomb and it's all gone". And even if that wasn't the case, losing one station would just mean a rebalancing of the European grid - flows changing direction, peaking coming online followed by reserve, etc. The significance of even losing all three (you're talking warfare, not terrorism - but what military would want to destroy a valuable export asset?) would depend heavily on when it happened.
Tunisia hasn't been in a war since World War II. There have only been two military skirmishes since then - one in 1961 with France over a naval base that France never gave up when Tunisia became independent, and the other a single bombing by the Israeli air force against a PLO headquarters. Internally, there have been brief periods of unrest - the most recent being the revolts that led to the resignation of Ben Ali (and the start of the Arab Spring) in 2010 - but they have never been associated with widespread bloodshed or destruction. The Tunisian Revolution in 2010, for example, only involved 338 deaths.
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Wouldn't the Extremadura be a less volatile place to put it?
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Possibly, but engineering is about balancing competing priorities, and stability must be factored against cost-base (undoubtedly higher in Spain), insolation (at least 20% higher in Tunisia) etc etc. TuNur describe the factors they took into account in determining the location on their website.
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Would the cost of making a plant in Spain 20% larger exceed the cost of securing a plant in the Sahara and installing undersea cables to it?
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Dunno. But I'm sure TuNur will have done the analysis quite carefully before concluding that this was the best location. There will be plenty of other factors besides cost: political will, likelihood of objections, geological stability, and on and on. The issues I mentioned above were examples, not exhaustive. On costs, I can think of the following factors that make a Spanish location more expensive cf Tunisia: labour, land, water, regulatory burden, lobbying, cost per km of transmission from Spain to the r
Re:Terrorism (Score:5, Insightful)
As usual, the /. pants-wetting crowd is quickly on the case, pointing out that yet another thing can be targeted by terrorists. News flash, EVERYTHING can be targeted by terrorists, and most of the time they are not. Quit listening to those that seek to gain power by instilling fear in the populace, they aren't doing you a favor.
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News flash, EVERYTHING can be targeted by terrorists
News flash: the value of a target increases proportionally to its footprint. There absolutely should be a much higher level of risk assessment for a 1,000 mile long cable that provides power to much of a country than for a local power station in that country, a fire hydrant on the street, etc. This is pretty easy stuff unless you're deliberately trying to be obtuse.
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Kind of hard to access most of that cable when it's underwater though... And it's not even 1000 miles long to reach Europe.
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Studies found that there is enough roof area for at least the household consumption of electricity.
The problem with this decentralized set-up is exactly that: it isn't centralized and Mr Big Money has more problems to get his thick fingers behind it. So now they come up with a central plant in the Sahara. Again 20% will be thrown away in transport and distribution costs.
Well, I guess it only depends on
Re:Terrorism (Score:4)
The problem with this decentralized set-up is exactly that: it isn't centralized and Mr Big Money has more problems to get his thick fingers behind it. So now they come up with a central plant in the Sahara.
Bullshit. Mr. Money can sell millions of Europeans solar panels, inverters, batteries and a service contract to maintain it all. Barring that they can still sell a grid connection to buy and sell electricity.
There's lots of money in energy. The problem with solar is cost. There is a reason that they want to put the collectors in Africa instead of Europe, there's more sun in Africa. Rooftop solar fails in so many places because the people may not be living where the sun it. Cheaper solar panels won't necessarily fix this because there's still more sun in Africa, it could just make the sun in Africa look better.
I love these conspiracy theories about how "the man" just wants to take everyone's money and give nothing in return. For every "the man" trying to keep people down with rent seeking there's another "the man" competing with the other "the man" for people's money. The one that offers the *MOST* for their money will win.
If decentralized solar makes sense in Europe then someone will be selling it. All kinds of people in the world are willing to stand in line to give money to someone that can free them from "the man". Government subsidies for big solar projects like this just prop up "the man" and traps the common person into another utility bill.
If you want "Mr. Money" to stop stealing from you then tell your elected representative to stop giving them *YOUR* money for these big centralized solar projects.
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Hint... it already is.
Politics not Terrorism (Score:3, Insightful)
Lets make our power dependent on one huge collection of transmission lines that can be taken down with one well placed bomb.
That could happen regardless of where you build the plant. The bigger concern is whether the EU really wants to hand the keys to its energy security over to a bunch of north African nations that are not exactly known for their stable governments and enlightened world view.
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One word.
TAKFIR
Due to the extremity of muslim factionalism, it becomes EASILY to see just this happening.
"Oh. They aren't REAL muslims!"
And why blow up power lines?
Simply crash a plane into the panel fields.
Do it a couple times as they try to rebuild.
It quickly becomes cost ineffective for them to rebuild.
Re: 4.5GW not that much (Score:2, Insightful)
And then we'd also be subjected to political extortion from Tunisia. Nit good.
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Re: 4.5GW not that much (Score:4, Interesting)
But it can free us from dependence on Russian gas.
That's funny, because I keep hoping the Russians will help free us from islamic oil... And I certainly don't want yet another energy dependency on that part of the world.
Re:dependence on Russian gas. (Score:5, Insightful)
Really, you don't think half a billion dollars in annual revenue (by my rough estimation of how much Tunisia stands to earn, with commercial rates and a realistic capacity factor and profit margin) would have an impact on the quality of living there?
Tunisia specifically modified their energy law in 2015 to allow projects like this. Tunisia doesn't have some scarcity of desert land, it has a scarcity of income.
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"many residents of the desert"
ha ha ha ha ha
Not to mention the insane idea of criticising a solar power project for sourcing power in a desert country. Because *that's* never happened with fossil fuel power generation before.
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4.5 GW is about 1.5% of the generating capacity of the EU. So you could switch the whole thing off and nobody would notice. Not a big threat really.
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Aside from that, there is a dividend in providing jobs in northern Africa - standards of living and education are raised and less people want to migrate to Europe, or radicalize.
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Tunisia -> italy via submarine cable is perhaps as stable as it gets.
Jobs are limited - a thousand or two during construction, but well under a hundred, operating.
Algeria has had an actual shooting civil war in the last 20 years, Libya,
The employment in even quite large solar plants is small.
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Doubt it.
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A quick check shows that the EU as a whole uses about 3,000,000 GW-hr per year.
This plant, assuming 12 hours a day of sunlight, and no downtime, will be good for about 40,000 GW-hr. Which means they'll add about 1.3% to their total, best case.
I find it hard to believe that an extra 1.3% is going to be a game-changer....
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Or people could also try and lower the energy they use.
I have a friend who still has incandescent light bulbs in his house, uses a 60" TV with an Xbox One to watch Netflix and then complains about his electric bill.
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we can't fix dependence on fossil fuels just by convincing everyone to use LEDs and power-saver modes.
Are you so sure about that? It's actually amazing how efficient some things can be, if required. We've not cared about inefficiencies in devices for a long time, and there is a LOT of low-hanging fruit there.
One good example actually happens to be LEDs. I've got fancy, programmable, color-changing LED bulbs in half my house now. They mimic sunrise and sunset at the same time every day, regardless of season. I find it really helps me get through dark winters. But those bulbs are 7W bulbs, and they a
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"This plant, assuming 12 hours a day of sunlight, and no downtime, "
This one generates heat and will produce power 24/7 not only during daytime.
Re:4.5GW not that much (Score:5, Insightful)
It provides significant power during times of peak demand. And it's the first one.
Anyway, if we are willing to invest tens of billions of Euros in single nuclear plants that generate less than half that much, it seems like it's pretty "significant".
But its enough... (Score:2)
To send 3.7 Delorians back to the future!!
Sorry.. had to be said.
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Damn, I'm going to have to use 1.21 GW to go back and beat you to this. Bravo sir.
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You use 1.21 gigawatts for one DeLorean and you use the remaining 3.29 gigawatts to power a replicator to make more solar panels.
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So I can assume that the main threat to it would be Libyan terrorists? ;)
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Barely enough to supply power to Ireland To really make a difference it would need to be about 450GW
You make it sound like that's not an accomplishment? An entire country on one power plant? If that's not making a difference you're not thinking about this in the right mindset.
Anyway, I wonder if anyone has attempted in doing some math on supply & demand for fossil fuels. Pretending they do *actually* build this thing, maybe another or two, which is a big pretend. How is this going to affect pricing of fossil fuels? What will 5% less demand in Europe correlate to, regarding the prices? 5% in lock
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Yeah, the company itself makes no grandiose claims about supplying much of Europe's needs. They are rather more fact-based: 2.5m homes. Not bad for 100sq km of desert. Plenty of room for expansion
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One of the advantages of solar is not being dependent for energy on people who hate us. This project would knock out that argument.
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Other options: https://www.icafrica.org/en/ne... [icafrica.org]
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Gosh, if only they had some engineers who'd been thinking about all that.
They quote 5% transmission loss per 1000km.
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Can you come to our small town and install solar panels for everyone for free?
Thank you in advance.
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Energy security? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Not just terrorists... (Score:5, Interesting)
I live in Vietnam and we've had our internet access severely crippled seven (eight, nine?) times in the last few years because the submarine cables connecting the country to the rest of the world have been mysteriously severed.
I've looked at the map and it seems that every time, the approximate place where the cables (I believe all three of the ones that currently connect Vietnam) have been cut has been in a place that it would only affect Vietnam. For example the Asian American Gateway cable connects the U.S. with a bunch of nations here but I think it was only in the spur that connects Vietnam that was cut.
Of course it could be due to natural causes; undersea disturbances, fishermen dredging up fiber optic cables for their copper cladding (about a decade ago that was the reason!), even sharks. But since the government made damaging these cables a crime against the "national infrastructure" (which may be a capital offense) and since Vietnam, unlike some of its neighbors, is not a particularly active seismic zone, I'm not so sure. Of course one major power would have the will and ability to sever these cables without Vietnam being able to do anything (and maybe not being able to catch them doing it): China. What better way to cripple your up and coming neighbor's economy while getting away with complete deniability. (Fortunately, not all the cables were cut at the same time but that could be because it was only meant as a warning).
I believe that once, in the 50s or 60s, the then Soviet Union tried to cut some of the transatlantic cables connecting the U.S. with Europe. I understand that the U.S. quickly determined that the cables were not failing due to natural causes and since there was only one other country with the means to do so, quickly told the Soviets to stop or it would be WAR. (The U.S. was also developing means of tracking all sorts of submarine activity so maybe they didn't have to rely on deduction). Unfortunately, the Vietnamese cannot absolutely positively pin it on the Chinese (other powers may be playing some sneaky dirty games) and anyway they don't have nukes (or a decent military) to push back 1.3 billion people! (They also don't have any kind of decent underwater surveillance capabilities in contrast to the sonar/intelligence net the Chinese are intending to deploy throughout the entire South China sea.)
So, as much as I'd like to see a jobs program to try to (vainly?) employ the exploding numbers of millions (hundreds of millions? Soon billions?) of under/unemployed Africans to reduce Europe's carbon footprint, I don't think the governments involved would take the risk of being so reliant on three cables that could be instantly cut. Better would be to export the power to sub-saharan Africa to drive their economies with cheap, zero-C power.
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Tunisia - and the other north african countries - are coastal and border the mediterranean sea so cable is going straight into the sea towards europe.
Re:Energy security? (Score:5, Insightful)
If you had a clue about geography (or just checked a map) you may have noticed that the cable would pass entirely in Tunisia, closer to the border with Algeria than with Libya. Both Tunisia and Algeria are relatively politically stable, although Algeria is not very democratic.
Anyway, it is possible that the project will go nowhere, but I'm pretty sure that the engineers and politicians involved will take due care to read all this Slashdot discussion and take in account your valuable expertise on the subject, they may even send you some money for the invaluable insight you have provided!
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Re:Energy security? (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right. But the current situation is that much of Europe's energy is supplied by Russia, which, in the current geopolitical climate, is even worse for energy security because it gives the Kremlin the power to strongarm the Union by threatening to raise prices or close the gas flow entirely.
If only there was a mineral of some sort in the ground that could be used to generate energy via nuclear fission that was safer per kilowatt than other energy production sources [forbes.com],and if only someone had devised ways of storing the radioactive waste safely [wikipedia.org]...
But because radiation is scary to people who do not understand the difference between modern reactors and Chernobyl/Fukushima, my fellow Europeans seem somehow terrified by it, even though countries like France have been using it to generate over a third of all their energy for long.
Don't get me wrong here, I'm not saying nuclear is the perfect solution. It's not. But it's a whole lot better for energy security and for the climate than continuing to use coal, oil and natural gas while we try to figure out cleaner solutions that work even in less sunny areas.
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But the current situation is that much of Europe's energy is supplied by Russia, which,
That is wrong. Especially if we talk about electricity.
Basically only Germany is importing from Russia and that is mostly gas for heating houses, not for making electricity.
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I'm not saying nuclear is the perfect solution. It's not. But it's a whole lot better for energy security and for the climate than continuing to use coal, oil and natural gas while we try to figure out cleaner solutions that work even in less sunny areas.
We don't have to figure them out. We just have to convince people to put them in. They already work.
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You're right. But the current situation is that much of Europe's energy is supplied by Russia, which, in the current geopolitical climate, is even worse for energy security because it gives the Kremlin the power to strongarm the Union by threatening to raise prices or close the gas flow entirely.
But as far as Russia is concerned, hampering the gas flow would be suicidal for their economy. Whether it would be as suicidal for a North African country renting land to a European power plant, I'm not so sure.
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Even if it were suicidal for the North African country, a terrorist may not care.
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It's not fear of radiation that makes nuclear unpopular in Europe, it's the cost. The new plant in the UK is the most expensive object on earth.
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Germany is shutting down the power plants because they are very expensive to operate and there is still no place to store radioactive waste - the state with the largest amount of nuclear power plants (Bavaria obviously - if there is a German state acting like a selfish prick then you can count on it being Bavaria) vehemently refuses to store the waste on their soil.
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> or do YOU know how make one from scratch?
Yes, I do, both old-school 'cloud chambers' [wikipedia.org] and modern GM tube style ones [wikipedia.org].
Don't you?
Re: (Another) Geography fail? (Score:2)
Tunisia is on the northern coast of Africa
A bit of a generalisation. The northern coastline of Tunisia is on the Med. But there is an awful lot of sand between that part of the country and the Saharan desert regions in the south. It also shares long borders with other countries - many parts of Tunisia are closer to Libya than to the northern coast.
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That's easy. The dessert stops at the box edges.
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You seem to forget that Aquaman posted a video a couple months ago in support of ISIS.
Nice... but.... (Score:2)
Do the Tunisians get any of the electricity?
Or do we just throw a few beads at them and move in?
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Do the Tunisians get any of the electricity? Or do we just throw a few beads at them and move in?
Now that is racist. Tunisians don't need payment in goods, rather payment in money and let them decide, if they rather spend it on electricity, built their own solar panels, build an ice skating ring in every town or whatever.
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I'm pretty sure criticizing former imperial powers for acting imperial again is somewhat appropriate to this conversation.
I just don't see how this project is imperial. It totally can be imperialistic and this project should be scrutinized, but unless you show coercion or massive corruption, calling it imperialistic is not appropriate.
As for the religion bit, that is just trolling, right? If not, I don't even...
African energy (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope that Africa create a lot of energy ... for africans.
Yeah... europeans could enjoy that massive energy though lines, but it's better that we raise african life quality instead to move the wealth to Europe and later have a lot of african migration into Europe.
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Re:African energy (Score:5, Insightful)
instead to move the wealth to Europe
How is this moving wealth to Europe? If Europe is paying for use of land, then this is transfer of wealth from Europe to Tunisia. It is an energy transfer to Europe, but unless Tunisia is using that energy (or the land, where that energy is falling on) for themselves, they are not losing anything (economically).
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Why do some areas with increased foreign investment become shanty towns (see Mexico) because 1000s of people without jobs flock there hoping to get a job themselves or make money selling things to those with those foreign jobs.
Great idea let's invest there (Score:2)
Re:Great idea let's invest there (Score:5, Insightful)
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it would likely become a lot more stable if the world suddenly found a serious self-interest in making it so.
This whole thing could go either way. The solar panels could become a recourse curse. Also, world interest could also give perverse incentive to back up dictators. War Collage had a interesting (albeit cynical) podcast on this [soundcloud.com].
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It actually is.
It is not Irak after all, or Syria.
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Desertec reborn? (Score:4, Interesting)
This sounds quite like Desertec [wikipedia.org], or at least a small variant or part thereof.
I'd hope for such a project to bring some more stability to the region, if it ever goes anywhere.
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It has been approved by the Desertec foundation.
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This sounds quite like Desertec [wikipedia.org], or at least a small variant or part thereof.
I'd hope for such a project to bring some more stability to the region, if it ever goes anywhere.
That was my thought, as I'd stumbled across the Desertec project years ago & thought it was worthwhile but unlikely given the political realities. It would be good for that region to have some other source of power / revenue than petrodollars.
Interesting:years-old advice coming to fruitation (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's the book - I thoroughly recommend it: Sustainable Energy - without the hot air [withouthotair.com].
It attempts a quantative approach to determining whether particular alternative sources of energy are useful and sustainable or not. It's a short read, politics free (neither "bah, it's all a hoax!" nor "do this immediately or DIE!") and is definitely worth the time of anyone interested in the subject.
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Thanks for the link. I note with some amusement, that there are translations into several other languages - including American, it seems :-) Nice to see their language finally gets some recognition.
thats nice here is a power plant the spanish built (Score:2)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andasol_Solar_Power_Station
Critical infrastructure (Score:2)
We need to be looking at solar/wind/etc technologies as ways to eliminate fragile national electric grids and to move to locally supplied power.
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For Europe to put itself at the mercy of vulnerable infrastructure transmitting energy across a volatile region would be crazy.
What do you think oil and gas supply is now, if not "vulnerable infrastructure transmitting energy across a volatile region"? This is a *diversification* and therefore a lowering of risk, in the European energy supply mix.
About sovereignity... (Score:3, Insightful)
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FFS. The press release cited here is entitled "TuNur files for authorisation for 4.5GW solar export project". The very first line of the release states that the authorisation being sought would be granted by the Tunisian Ministry of Energy, Mines and Renewable Energy. The land is owned by El Ghrib Collective Lands Management Board and is being leased by TuNur, not owned.
Yes, this may be a resource curse, but it's not being set up as one.
Energy distribution. (Score:4, Insightful)
There is a reason why we have power plants spread across the world vs 1 or 2 really big ones in every country. It is getting the power produced from the plant going to the homes. A lot of that energy is already being turned into heat and sound just from the resistance of the cables. Sure smart grids, help the problem, but it doesn't solve the problem.
That is why I much prefer local energy production, solar panels and or wind turbine with battery backup on your home, perhaps with a small grid shared with your neighbors. While the cost may be higher, it offers a degree of freedom in your living, and you can mostly keep or sell the energy that you don't use. Vs. hooked up to a grid of either noticeable hanging cables, or having crews dig up your yard and regulations to make sure you can't dig in your own property. And if you don't pay your bill your power gets cut off, placing you in a situation where you cant make more money.
If we could Green Energy could probably fit well in a conservative agenda, if we could get big oil and the religious extremists out of the picture.
And in the U.S. (Score:2)
Wait a darn minute (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought with all the renewable energy Europe is supposed to be producing, they were going to be completely green in just a few years. You mean they're going to have to get energy from North Africa in order to keep from freezing to death?
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Grid stability requires diverse sources of energy. Cheaper to do solar-thermal in the Sahara than PV+batteries in Germany, although the two are not mutually exclusive.
Canada (Score:2)
It's too bad nobody is working on "cold panels" because they would work a lot better in Canada compared to solar panels.
Why Sahara? Why not in arid Europe? (Score:2)
Seems like you could put a vast array of solar panels in several places throughout Europe where cloud cover is minimal, like Greece or Spain. Surely these countries would be amenable to adding those new jobs and and are much more politically stable and secure than anywhere in north Africa, making this big investment far less risky.
Once Europe's solar farms are profitable, their success will encourage that economic model to spread and attract investment elsewhere, even where security and infrastructure is l
Great Scott!!! (Score:3)
That could power three Deloreans!
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There is extensive material on the TuNur website about the benefits for Tunisia. You could have looked it up instead of whining.
http://www.nurenergie.com/tunu... [nurenergie.com]