(July 6, 2011 at 11:24 pm)popeyespappy Wrote: The Hualapai Valley Solar Project is a planned 340 MW parabolic trough power plant to be built near Kingman, AZ. It will produce the equivalent output of more than 2 large nuclear reactors when completed. The estimated cost to build a two reactor nuclear plant is about $17 billion. It has been estimated that the Hualapai Valley plant is going to cost about $2 billion to build. Plus operations at the solar facility are going to cost a fraction of what it would to operate a similar sized nuclear facility.
Huh, no. A modern large nuclear reactor would support power output in the 1200-1600 MW range, depending on the design, and would cost about 6-8 billion to permit and build. So MW capacity for MW capacity is cheaper than your solar plant to build. Furthermore a nuclear reactor would be able to operate at full power 24X7, unlike a solar plant, which only operate near full power in the middle part of the day and shuts down completely by night. So even if the nominal maximum power output is the same, a nuclear plant can deliver 3 time more energy over the same period as a solar plant, thus making it easier to recoup initial investment.
Solar thermal is falling behind photo-voltaic in approaching grid parity (grid parity means having the ability to compete economically without needing government subsidy)
