Solar Power Australia – The Moree Solar Plant

Two weeks ago, Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced plans for two new Solar Power Plants in Australia. In a photo op complete with hard hat and darkened glasses to protect from the bright light, she posed for photographs at a place where all that exists now is the site for the as yet unconstructed Concentrating Solar Power Plant at Chinchilla in Queensland, a plant that will not be delivering power until 2015.

That new plant was a Concentrating Solar Power Plant, and for analysis of this Plant, read the Post at this link.

At the same time as she was announcing this new plant, details were also released for a second Solar Power Plant, this one at Moree, in Northern Central New South Wales.

The information about this plant is at this link. (pdf document)

This plant will be a Solar Photovoltaic (Solar PV) plant, and while both plants are Solar plants, there are differences in both of them, as I also explained at the earlier Post linked to above.

The estimated cost for this plant is $923 Million, and for the sake of comparison let’s correlate that to an already existing plant, Bayswater, which is a large scale coal fired plant that supplies 2640MW of power as it’s total.

Bayswater 2640MW

Moree 150MW at $923 Million

On the surface, this means that to theoretically replace the power delivered from Bayswater, you would need 18 of these plants, hence $16.62 Billion. However, that’s not the whole story, but even just that simple statistic tells a story that these plants are enormously expensive.

The plant itself says that it will (also theoretically) deliver 404GWH (GigaWattHours) of electricity to the end consumers.

Bayswater actually delivers 17,500GWH of power to consumers, so using that multiplier, you now reach a total of $40.6 Billion. However, that also is not the whole story, but see how ridiculous this is now becoming.

THAT WORD THEORETICAL.

This photograph was taken by Senior Airman Larry E Reid Jr. as part of his official duties and is in the public domain

The plant at Moree will use Solar cells to generate the electricity. Those cells are on Panels and the panels will be attached to stands (tracking tables) that will track the Sun across the sky.

The image at right shows a group of some of those tracking tables at the Solar PV Power plant at Nellis AFB in Nevada.

In the announcement, the release stated that this plant will be able to generate 150MW of power, and supply enough power for 50,000 Australian homes.

The direct mention of those homes is part of a ‘trick’ that the proposers of plants like this utilise, and I’ll explain that as we go along.

So, when those ‘green’ followers read this wonderful media release, they think that here is a plant that actually does deliver large amounts of power to move them in the direction of replacing those coal fired power plants, those emitters of that ‘nasty’ Greenhouse Gas, Carbon Dioxide. (CO2)

So then, what really is the truth of the matter when it comes to a plant like this.

A lot of what is being ‘assumed’ in the release of details for this Plant is theoretical, and to actually explain that is not an easy thing, and my task is to attempt to explain it so it can be understood.

Monocrystalline Silicon Wafer Solar Cell. Image in the Public Domain.

A solar cell generates electricity, and an example for this that might readily come to mind are those solar powered calculators that were all the rage in the 80’s.

The image at left is that of a typical solar cell, and if you click on the image, it will open in a new and larger window.

This is a Crystalline Silicon wafer cell, and is similar to the ones being used for this proposed plant at Moree.

Each cell generates a small amount of voltage.

Cells are grouped together on a large panel, (shown below at right)  and typically, there are around 72 cells to a panel.

This plant at Moree will have 645,000 of these panels. There will be be ten panels to a solar tracking table (similar to what is shown in the image at the top of the Post) so there will be 64,500 of these individual large tables at this new Plant.

So, if each cell can generate a voltage, then they just multiply that voltage by the number of cells per panel, and then by the total number of panels, and that gives a total theoretical power that could be generated.

The generated voltage is DC, and to convert it to the AC used by all consumers, this will be done with the use of Inverters, and for this Moree Plant there will be 260 of these large Inverters. Here, something that also needs to be taken into account is that with the use of Inverters to convert the DC to AC, there is around a 10% loss in total power.

Then, so the power can be transmitted via High Tension transmission cables, there will be Transformers, and this plant will have 128 of those large Transformers.

So, theoretically, a total power for all those cells adds up to that 150MW.

Now, because of the nature of daylight, that theoretical total power might only be generated at one point in time with the Sun at its peak. Because there is less light in the early AM, and late PM daylight hours, then the power generated is less than that maximum.

So here, again based on a theoretical amount, this Moreee plant says that they can generate power at a 31% efficiency rating.

Hmm! That’s a bit of a worry really.

According to already established theory, these types of cell have a maximum theoretical efficiency of 29%. Currently the best solar cell plant on the Planet is achieving 23% and the average is closer to 15.3% which is half of what is claimed by the proposers of this plant.

So then, let’s pretend that they can actually achieve this 31% for power generation.

That is where they come up with a proposed power delivery to consumers of that 404GWH.

This gives the plant of 150MW Nameplate Capacity a Capacity Factor of that 31%.

Effectively that then translates to the time this plant is actually producing its maximum power, and averaged out, that then comes to just under 7.5 hours a day.

THE TRICK.

As I mentioned proposers of plants like this use a trick to mislead people into thinking plants like this are in fact producing large amounts of power.

Imagine a proposal coming out that specifically says that they will only be providing power for around those 7 hours a day. Some people might add one and one and would start to ask some questions.

So, how they disguise that is like this.

They have this theoretical total power figure. From established data, they know exactly how much power a household residence consumes in a year. They divide that household figure into their theoretical total power and come up with a number of homes that this plant can supply with ‘clean green power’.

This isn’t something that just this plant has used here. Go to the site for any of these renewable power plants, any of them, and you’ll see exactly the same thing.

‘Our great new clean energy plant can supply green power for (X) number of homes.’

It looks great on the surface, and gives the impression that here is a plant that actually does provide a lot of power.

However, as is the nature of every renewable power plant, they can never supply power on that 24/7/365 basis, and as every household consumes electricity on that ‘all the time’ basis, plants of this nature will never supply that power. Those 30,000 homes are not connected directly to this plant. The power that the plant supplies is sent to the overall grid, where power is consumed in three sectors, Residential 38%, Commerce 37%, and Industrial 24%.

Some green followers say that this is just an analogy, so OK then let’s keep with that analogy then.

Bayswater Power Plant supplies power for 2.2 MILLION homes, which sure puts this plant’s 50,000 homes into perspective.

OTHER ASPECTS OF THIS PLANT.

This Moree Plant will be constructed in 4 stages, over those 4 years of construction.

It will occupy an area of 1200 Hectares, which is 12 square Kilometres or 4.6 Square Miles.

Part of the submission says that there will be minimal use of water, as the panels will only be washed twice a year.

What?

Twice a year. The slightest film of dust and these panels can lose up to two thirds of their generating capacity. That same principle applies with clouds. As soon as a cloud crosses the face of the Sun, again, the panels lose up to two thirds of their generating capability, and it takes time after that cloud goes away for the power to slowly build up.

However, as to cleaning, these panels need to be kept absolutely pristine to be able to generate at their maximum, and by pristine, that’s not washing them twice a year, but kept highly polished at all times, which now becomes a little problematic, considering there are 645,000 of those panels. Cleaning the panels is also not an easy task, as during daylight hours, the panels are quite hot to the touch, so any cleaning, which can obviously only be done by hand would need to be done in the cool of the morning or early evening, and let me again repeat the number of panels, 645,000.

The submission also says that the plant has an expected operating life of 30 to 50 years.

50 Years???

The known commercial life span of these panels is 20 years, but they can be expected to be partly functional for up to 25 to 30 years maximum. Even so, these panels are only expected to provide their power at 90% for the first ten years, and at 80% for the second ten year block, and because that is the expectation, no percentage figures are given for any further period of time.

With each new paragraph, that total theoretical power delivery of 404GWH looks to be getting less and less.

CONCLUSIONS.

While on the surface, the proposal for this new solar power plant looks to be quite attractive, there is always more to it when the facts are sought out.

I mentioned above that you could use two comparisons when comparing the overall cost of this plant and then extrapolate it out to replace just the one large scale coal fired plant.

With Nameplate Capacity, you would need 18 of these plants to replace just the one Bayswater, and at $923 Million, the total comes in at $16.6 Billion.

With actual power provided you would need $40.6 Billion.

Then consider on top of that Bayswater has a known life span at least twice to three times that of a Solar Plant of this nature, so double or even triple both those figures.

However, to compare them on this scale is a little anomalous, because while Bayswater can supply its power for 24/7/365, and these plants like this can only offer around 7 hours a day of power delivery, at their theoretical claimed best.

There will be people who will always think Plants like this are the way we must be taking for the future, and those people will disagree with what I have said here in this analysis. However, for average, thinking people who do read this, it’s just one indicator as to how these types of plant that will be supplying the electrical power of the future cannot deliver power for the scale that it is needed, and if this is to be the way of the future, then that future looks bleak as to the constant availability of power, and will be costing all of us an absolute fortune, not only for the construction of these plants, but extrapolated out into the cost of that electrical power for us all.

I have no reason to make anything up here, or even to quote figures that might ‘seem’ to be ‘massaged’ to give the impression of making a plant like this look bad.

I specifically always use only the data provided by these plants, which in every case is always the absolute best case scenario. Even when using their own figures, once it is correctly explained, and put into context, these plants look exactly like they really are. A ridiculously stupid answer to a question that has already been effectively answered, that of the supply of electrical power to cover every contingency, and for when it is required.

In closing, let’s actually pretend that the wildest dreams of this plant actually do come true, and that this plant, contrary to everything I’ve mentioned above, actually can provide that 404GWH of power to consumers.

For some perspective on that, Bayswater IS actually delivering that same amount of power for consumers ….. every 8 days and 10 hours.

Tagged: Bayswater Power Plant, Moree Solar Power Plant, Solar Photovoltaic Power, Solar Power Generation

Posted in: Australia, Climate Change, Fraud/Waste, Public Opinion, Solar Power