Aora
An Isreali company has developed what I believe is a very innovative and technically interesting product. It is also very encouraging as it may have far reaching implications for developing countries that do not have an infrastructure of centrally generated electrical power. The company is AORA-Solar and they have developed a hybrid solar power station that they are testing in Isreal’s Negev desert. The system use both traditional fuels such as diesel ,natural gas or bio-fuels and the power of the sun.
The company calls it a solarized gas turbine and typically each microturbine is capable of producing 100kWe. This hybrid solar turbine produces power on demand from a solar tower thermal system of focused sunlight from heliostat controlled mirrors on the ground provided there is sufficient sunlight to meet demand. If more power is required than the hybrid turbine produces the difference from the conventional fuels.
According to Pinchas Doran, Chief Technical Officer for AORA the system will automatically shift between sun and conventional fuel as required.
Beginning next year if all goes well the company hopes to begin installing additional systems around Isreal and to begin exporting the technology to markets such as California, Arizone, Austalia and southern europe.
Yaval Susskind, Operations Manager for Aora-Solar:
My vision is to see one of these puppies ( hybrid tower) outside of every villlage in Africa.
Aora
Aora sucessfully completed a pilot installation in China in 2006 before beginning their latest project in the Arava Valley in southern Isreal.
The solarised gas turbine product offers to contribute towards the resolution of energy shortages in Nigeria and Africa. Keep me updated on this technology as well as partnership in promoting the technology in Nigeria
I love it. I have worked with Solar Thermal for many years.
This takes out CO2
Please take a look
http://www.language-power.cn/how-to-save-the-world.html
Wayne
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Are there any reports on the suitability of solar thermal for use in the tropics where the humidity is high and the sunlight more diffuse?
Is there any solar thermal power station in Nigeria presently and if they are any tell me and where can i find it?
Wow, this blog is definately getting bookmarked. Great Info all over the place.
AORA has a testing site at the Eilat-Eilot Renewable Energy Technological Center. They will be featured at the Renewable Energy conference in Eilat in Feb. If you are in the renewable energy field, this is the conference to attend. There will be many serious discussions about real implementation and commercial deployment. The goal is fossil-fuel free energy.
Very interesting. Paired with a biofuel like biogas, biodiesel or alcohol, this would mean truly renewable source of power. Questions still circulate around cost per installed kW, ongoing availability and cost of fuel and maintenance, working lifespan, etc.
This solution should obviously be compared to an “unbundled” approach with liqud fuels producing power round the clock supplemented by solar for daytime power, water heating, cooking, etc.