Concentrated solar energy going large-scale across Arizona

Last year, state regulators approved some 150 megawatts of renewable-energy projects to be owned by TEP or developed under power-purchase contracts with the utility, including more than 130 megawatts of new solar power plants by 2013. Six of those solar energy projects are expected to go online by the end of this year.

One megawatt, or 1 million watts, worth of solar capacity is roughly enough to power about 160 typical TEP homes, the utility estimates. On top of those projects, the Arizona Corporation Commission has approved TEP’s plan to spend up to $28 million annually for about 7 MW of new company-owned or contracted solar-power capacity each year through 2014.

And the state’s biggest power company, Phoenix-based Arizona Public Service Co., plans to increase its solar output more than sevenfold by 2013, with major utility-scale projects including an 18-MW photovoltaic plant and a massive, 280-MW concentrating solar thermal power plant, both in the sun-soaked desert near Gila Bend.

Driven by taxpayer subsidies, state renewable-energy mandates and plunging equipment costs, the U.S. market for utility-scale solar energy farms is expected to double each year between 2010 and 2015, to $8 billion, according to a study released in November by GreenTech Media, a Cambridge, Mass.-based research group.

In 2010, 274 MW of utility-scale solar power plants were expected to be connected to the grid – a 370 percent increase from 2009. GreenTech projects are planned to double in 2011 and reach 5,600 MW by 2015.

Utility-scale installations will help TEP and other utilities meet a state standard that regulated utilities generate an increasing amount of power from renewables, including solar and wind. "We are planning a mix of resources to meet the mandate," said TEP spokesman Joe Salkowski.

Utilities must generate energy equal to 15 percent of their retail power sales by 2025, in increasing increments that will hit 3 percent this year. The goal is supported by a system of incentives – cash rebates – funded by ratepayers through monthly surcharges.

The renewable energy standard, adopted by the Corporation Commission in 2007, requires that utilities get at least 20 percent of their renewable energy from so-called "distributed generation" – installations on customer sites that feed into the main power grid but offset each customer’s individual usage.

Utility-scale installations – typically ranging in size from a few megawatts to hundreds of megawatts – supply power directly to utilities that own the plants or the rights to the power they generate.

Since the latest state renewable-energy standards went into effect in 2007, much of the development has taken place on customer rooftops, driven by incentives paid to customers, the expansion of solar installation companies and a relatively streamlined approval process.

Because of their size and cost, utility-scale solar projects have taken longer to develop – some current projects have been years in planning – but their contribution to the power grid will dwarf that of rooftop systems.

Through the third quarter of 2010, distributed systems installed on TEP’s system contributed about 9.7 MW of generating capacity, with nearly the same amount in the pipeline for the next year or so.

Multi-megawatt, utility-scale solar has some distinct advantages over rooftop systems in cost and available technology. While TEP estimates the cost of rooftop photovoltaic systems at about $5.50 per watt, not including incentive payments, utility-scale solar runs about $3.50 per watt, Salkowksi said.

Because utility-scale solar power plants are larger and their power is fed directly to the utility, it’s easier to manage to help fill peak power needs than thousands of smaller systems channeled through customers’ meters, Salkowski said. "We have to have that energy handy, the moment it’s needed," he said.

While rooftop solar systems are almost invariably fixed photovoltaics, utility scale allows developers to economically add such features as sun-tracking panels, which can add 25 percent to a panel’s output.

Large scale also allows other technologies – like solar thermal systems, which harvest the heat from sunlight to produce power from steam generators – that are too costly or impractical for rooftop installation. TEP is adding several utility-scale plants using tracking systems and advanced technologies, including tracking systems and photovoltaic concentrating technology, which focuses light on solar cells to minimize the use of photovoltaic materials.

TEP also is planning one solar concentrating solar power thermal plant, a 5 MW system with heat storage, at the Solar Zone at the UA tech park. The system, being built by Bell Independent Power Corp. with expected completion in 2013, will store heat to keep generators running hours after sundown.

That would help the utility handle peak-power demands in the late afternoon and evening, when photovoltaic panels peter out, Salkowski said. "Storage is a long-term strategy, as renewable energy plays a larger role in our generation resources," he said. "In the meantime, we’re waiting to see the technology develop further."

But APS has made a significant bet on stored thermal solar energy with its Solana plant, which recently broke ground about 6 miles north of Gila Bend after finalizing $1.45 billion in federal loan guarantees in mid-December. The plant, being built by Spanish-owned Abengoa Solar and expected online in 2013, will store heat in molten salt tanks for up to 12 hours of generation, said Eran Mahrer, APS director of renewable energy.

That allows the plant to provide "dispatchable" power while the summer heat lingers into the night, when photovoltaic power is unavailable, Mahrer said. APS has about 55 MW of solar online now, both distributed and utility-scale, and another 470 MW in development.

But not every grand solar project sees the light of day. In October 2009, Lockheed Martin and a solar development partner canceled plans to build a in a 290 MW solar-thermal plant in western Maricopa County to serve APS, calling the project too costly.

The boom in Big Solar is not only good for the environment, it’s shining on the local economy. Solon Corp., a German-based photovoltaic-panel maker that opened its U.S. headquarters in Tucson in 2007, has expanded as it has ramped up systems aimed squarely at the utility and large commercial markets.

Solon recently installed its modular Velocity photovoltaic system, rolled out in 2009, in a 1.6-megawatt photovoltaic array at the Solar Zone, part of the University of Arizona Science and Technology Park. The system of preconfigured, 1-MW modules uses Solon’s high-efficiency crystalline silicon solar panels along with its proprietary single-axis tracking system, which tilts the solar panels up and down to maximize light collection during the day.

Installation of that array, owned by Tucson Electric Power Co. and the first at the solar demonstration park, wrapped up in December and the system will be formally dedicated later this month.

Solon is building an 18 MW single-axis tracker – consisting of more than 75,000 solar panels on 145 acres near Gila Bend for Arizona Public Service Co. That projected is slated for completion by the end of this year. Daniel Alcombright, Solon regional vice president and general manager for North America, said the company expects a robust demand for utility-scale projects.

"Utilities want to start taking more control of this and putting in more of their own solar power plants," Alcombright said. The size of utility-scale systems allows utilities to take advantage of energy-boosting technologies and economies of scale.

Alcombright noted that the company’s tracking system – proven at a 1 MW plant built last year at Pima County’s Roger Road Wastewater Reclamation Facility – can boost power output by 25 percent. Solon’s solar fields are installed in assembly-line fashion, with one crew starting with mounting footers, followed by frame assemblers, panel installers and electricians, Alcombright said.

"In the past 18 months, we’ve reduced the cost of installing these systems by a factor of two (by half), which is just amazing," he said. Solon, which expanded to a larger Tucson operation at 6950 S. Country Club Road in 2009, has grown its work force to about 150 from about 100 a year ago.

The utility-scale push also has been good for Schletter Inc., which makes metal mounting systems for commercial and utility-scale solar installations and opened a plant in Tucson in 2008. To handle rapid growth, Schletter last year moved its local operation from a 22,000-square foot midtown location to a 70,000-square-foot building near Interstate 10 and South Alvernon Way.

And Schletter’s full-time work force grew to 80 last year from 45 in 2009, said Sven Kuenzel, vice president of sales and marketing for Schletter. "All of these big projects that were getting press seem to be coming through now," he said.