Solar to join up with coal power station

news.smh.com.au
October 4, 2009

A project to boost a coal-fired Queensland power station with a solar plant is further proof that renewable technology is capable of large-scale electricity generation, says Australian physicist David Mills. The Queensland government and Ausra Inc, a US-based thermal solar technology company founded by Dr Mills, have submitted a joint application to the federal government to fund a portion of the project to add a 23 MW (MW) solar plant to the existing 750 MW Kogan Creek coal power station on the Darling Downs.

"It's a means of testing and getting the technology commercial in large plants with their own turbines," Dr Mills, now Ausra's chief scientific officer, told Sky Business News on Sunday. "It is a small amount, but it's a relatively large solar array compared to what's gone on in Australia before. The utility will be able to get familiar with the basic technology applications." Dr Mills said his company aimed to eventually produce power stations 10 times larger than the one at Kogan Creek.

Ausra has developed and produced solar thermal generators with mirrors that reflect concentrated sunlight onto pipes, heating water inside to make steam for turbines to spin generators. Dr Mills said there was no guarantee at this stage that the Queensland project would proceed because he didn't know how far the application for funds had progressed.

"We really don't know what is happening to the applications," he said. "The government said it would be fast-tracked but we really haven't seen anything. "The Queensland government has signalled very, very strongly in their recent statement that they want this project to go ahead and they're willing to commit very serious funds to the utilities to make it happen."

Dr Mills developed much of Ausra's technology as an academic in Sydney, but said there was much more money available in California in 2007 to get Ausra established. "We were offered about five times the funds for an equivalent share in our company compared to what we could get from Australia and that really set us on a strong course," he said. "You need a lot of cash and you need to prove these things over months and years to get people to be happy with the risk involved."

Dr Mills believes solar energy could eventually supply base load power. Ausra is developing methods to store heat so that it can be used during the night or on cloudy days, he said. "We have the potential there for such plants to go for 24 hours," he said. "The development of storage is still young, but the first 50 MW parabolic trough plant has just gone into Spain with enough storage to run night and day."