A new solar plant in California is due to have construction started on it in the next few months. Unusually, the solar plant is not your typical photovoltaic solar panels – instead, BrightSource Energy will be using solar thermal technology.

Photovoltaic cells are what most people think of when solar power is talked about. Photovoltaic cells are the most popular form of solar power and there are plenty of these types of cells available for residential use.

Howvever BrightSource Energy will be using solar-thermal technology for their energy plant. Solar-thermal energy uses sunlight to produce heat. The heat produces steam which then drives a turbine which generates electricity. A photovoltaic cell, in contrast, generates electricity directly from the Sun’s rays.

Solar-thermal power stations can be built to a large scale far more easily than a solar-photovoltaic power station, and are usually far cheaper to build. As the heat can also be stored, the energy output of a solar-thermal power plant is not as erratic as that of a solar-photovoltaic energy plant. It is also possible to easily fit natural-gas boilers into solar-thermal power plants to ensure that they produce regular supplies of energy, even if gas is not a renewable form of energy.

The one major stipulation for a solar thermal power plant is that it should be built in an area which has a lot of uninterrupted sunshine to ensure that the plant is efficient and produces a good, regular supply of energy. At present, there is only around 500 megawatts of capacity in solar thermal plants at the moment, however with plenty of companies interested in the technology, this capacity is set to increase dramatically in the next few years.

Solar thermal power is not a new idea – in fact, it has it’s roots in China and ancient Greece where the sun’s rays were often focused with mirrors or glass to light fires. A similar technique has also been used to set enemy boats on fire.

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