To help propel new forms of renewable energy, the Department of Energy’s Solar Energy Technologies Office has been encouraging development of next generation concentrating solar power (CSP) systems. CSP systems offer a distinct advantage over photovoltaics by enabling energy storage through means other than batteries. CSP uses a field [...]
Sandia Labs is building a concentrated solar power demonstration facility that is scheduled for completion in 2024. Remember when a camp counselor showed you how to use a magnifying glass to burn your name onto a piece of wood? That’s essentially what concentrated solar power or CSP does. An [...]
The U.S. Department of Energy celebrated the groundbreaking of its Generation 3 concentrating solar-thermal pilot facility at Sandia National Laboratories. This demonstration is the culmination of a $100 million research effort to develop next-generation concentrating solar-thermal power (CSP) plants and showcase storage technology that could provide one gigawatt of storage [...]
The pilot at Sandia will demonstrate its next-generation high-temperature concentrated solar technology that can be used for energy storage, power production, industrial process heat, or solar fuel production. Among the challenges addressed during the particle-based high-temperature solar technology developed at Sandia is that at any one time, almost 3 tons [...]
Join Sandia National Laboratories’ National Solar Thermal Test Facility as it hosts, “Thermal Energy Storage Paradigms,” with featured guest Dr. Charles Forsberg, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Thursday, Sept. 8, 2022, from 9:00 a.m.-10:00 a.m., MT. This fifth session of the Quarterly Concentrating Solar Seminar Series will include: [...]
Sandia National Laboratories began studying the power of the sun to produce utility-scale energy in the 1960s. Sandia’s National Solar Thermal Test Facility was commissioned in 1978, spurred by the oil crisis of 1973. Many of the documents detailing the design, construction and research conducted at the world’s first multimegawatt [...]
Researchers from Sandia National Laboratories recently used 22-foot-wide tethered balloons to collect samples of airborne dust particles to ensure the safety of an emerging solar-power technology. The study determined that the dust created by the new technology is far below hazardous levels, said Cliff Ho, the lead researcher on [...]
Sandia National Laboratories has been awarded a $25 million contract to build, test and operate a new solar power test facility on its campus in New Mexico. Using a concentrated beam of sunlight to heat up sand-like particles, lab officials say the system will be able to produce thermal energy [...]
Sandia National Laboratories is currently seeking applications from industry, academia, research laboratories, government agencies, and individuals to further technologies related to Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) at the National Solar Thermal Test Facility (NSTTF), a Core Capability and Technology Deployment Center of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies [...]
The new flow control valves will improve heat distribution and minimise risks at critical joints, allowing higher CSP temperatures and greater energy conversion efficiency, research group Sandia National Laboratories told Reuters Events. New flow control valves being developed by US researchers could help CSP developers meet ambitious cost reduction targets. [...]
Today, the U.S. Department of Energy announced that the United States will host the world’s biggest conference on concentrating solar power (CSP) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. In October 2020, SolarPACES (Solar Power and Chemical Energy Systems), a program of the International Energy Agency, will bring together researchers from around the [...]
From testing space shuttle tiles to making electricity from sunlight, for forty years Sandia National Laboratories has contributed to energy research, space exploration, defense testing and solar energy commercialization at its world-leading National Solar Thermal Test Facility in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The facility’s primary goal is to provide experimental engineering [...]
From testing space shuttle tiles to making electricity from sunlight, the world’s first multimegawatt solar tower has contributed to energy research, space exploration, defense testing and solar energy commercialization since it was commissioned at Sandia National Laboratories in July 1978. In 1978, Sandia National Laboratories began concentrating solar power research [...]
