(Video below) In the global race to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels, the three biggest challenges the Alternative Energy industry faces have always seemed insurmountable…until now.
Israeli company, Brenmiller Energy has seen such success with their new Solar technology that they are already expanding to Africa to provide rural communities with cost effective power without the cost and inefficiency of hundreds of miles of transmission lines.
CEO and President, Avi Brenmiller actually developed and tested the technology in California while serving as CEO of Solel/Siemens CSP in the late 90’s. Now with a fully functional test facility in Israel, they have proven the effectiveness and bankability of this breakthrough operation. See their profile on GreenBusinesses.com.
How Does it Work?
While most equate Solar Energy with the collection and distribution of energy via solar panels, Brenmiller’s Solar plant utilizes parabolic mirrors to focus the sun’s rays to generate steam from a series of water pipes (see video). The steam then drives a turbine to produce energy and stores extra heat underground as additional power for 24/7 demand.
The Challenges Overcome
These three titanic challenges have proven problematic for global altnernative energy adoption. As Brenmillar claims, all three have been overcome.
1. Scalability – the ability to create a scalable solution that can accommodate both large and smaller users. This is the main challenge of the previous technologies as the facilities required do not really make economic sense at levels below 50MWe.
2. Power Availability – for solar power to become a true alternative energy source, we need the ability to dispatch the power when it is most needed, be it early morning or late afternoon, as determined by the user.
3. Price Competiveness – ability to compete with existing technologies on a like for like basis. In the case of CSP, this would mean a comparison on each area required, i.e. for a square meter of collector area, how much energy is generated. –
Sources include CSP Today
More about Bren Energy here
Produced By Matt Johnston and Reuters
