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Cleantech's solar array will be seven times larger than the next closest rival

Portugal announced in April that it was home to one of the world's largest solar arrays. The 150 acre, 11-megawatt (MW) solar plant was built by Catavento and PowerLight Corporation and is capable of powering 8,000 homes in Serpa.

Cleantech America LLC., a San Francisco-based company, plans to build a solar farm that would far eclipse the one built in Portugal. The new 80 MW farm, known as the Kings River Conservation District Community Choice Solar Farm, will be situated on 640 acres of land and is scheduled to be completed by 2011.

"We're pretty confident that solar farms on this scale are going to have an industry-changing impact," said Cleantech CEO Bill Barnes. "We think it's the wave of the future. This scale of project, I think, creates a tipping point for renewable energy."

"We think the impact for it will be similar to the impact of the computer chip," Barnes continued. "So too will economies of scale like the Community Choice farm drive down the cost of solar."

Cleantech estimates that the energy generated by the solar array will be enough to power 20,000 homes.

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640 acres is a lot of land
By drank12quartsstrohsbeer on 7/10/2007 9:31:55 AM , Rating: 5
What is going to happen to the land itself? Will plants and little critters be able to survive underneath these panels or will they destroy the habitat?




RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By mars2k on 7/10/2007 9:45:05 AM , Rating: 1
You're talking about desert here. This is one square mile. This is not a solid panel. What critters? What plants?


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By LogicallyGenius on 7/10/2007 11:58:51 AM , Rating: 5
ya, its better than those bioFuel farms created by chopping the native forests.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By dever on 7/10/2007 3:41:16 PM , Rating: 2
More importantly, how much special-interest money is helping to fund this? I'd be surpised if this is anywhere near feasible without raping individual incomes through taxation and giving the proceeds to a large energy company.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By RogueSpear on 7/10/2007 9:19:44 PM , Rating: 2
Much more of your money is going to support oil and corn farmers. So what exactly do you mean by "special interest money"? Do you even have any idea of what you're talking about?


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Chernobyl68 on 7/10/2007 6:03:57 PM , Rating: 2
Fresno isn't exactly a desert, is it?


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By MrTeal on 7/10/2007 9:45:16 AM , Rating: 3
One square mile. I wonder how many square miles the 2200 MW Diablo Canyon nuclear plant sits on?


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By kattanna on 7/10/2007 10:03:34 AM , Rating: 2
the actual lot size with all the buildings/parking lots..etc is maybe 40 acres. though the plant also encompases several hundred acres of pristine land used for grazing and wildlife.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By TomZ on 7/10/2007 10:08:32 AM , Rating: 5
OK, so this project will use 16X the amount of land to produce 1/27th the amount of energy. I guess efficient land use is not one of the selling points.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By FITCamaro on 7/10/2007 10:27:12 AM , Rating: 2
/sarcasm

Nuclear power is evil though.

/end sarcasm


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By ZmaxDP on 7/10/2007 11:01:28 AM , Rating: 5
Gee, since it is southern California, why don't they just set up a requirement that any homes use a certain amount of their roof area for solar energy collection and then subsidize it with rebates on solar panels and inverters. Each home gets a grid tied system and lower energy bills with less cost to the state overall. And, you aren't using up an "pristine" land that isn't already built on.

Oh wait, that is a practical idea - it would never go over in any state or federal government, much less California...


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By ZmaxDP on 7/10/2007 11:02:29 AM , Rating: 2
Should be "less cost to the state and consumer overall." Kind of an important point.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By jaybuffet on 7/10/2007 1:12:19 PM , Rating: 2
I'm not sure about California, but I believe some places already do this. In fact, if you provide energy to the grid, they will credit your account


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Cygni on 7/10/2007 1:23:19 PM , Rating: 4
the problem with your idea is that you are looking at 20+ years before the solar panels will pay themselves off to the homeowner. forcing an area with already over inflated housing costs (and general cost of living) to add $20,000 to their cost of ownership for some dream of saving the air, when the fact of the matter is that LA's cars create way more polution than its energy production, is a pretty bad idea. especially considering the fact that producing a solar pannel has a pretty significant carbon footprint itself.

forcing people to put the inefficient solar panels we have today on their houses is not the answer, and its not a new or novel solution that nobody has thought of. solar as of today is not world saving, nor is it 'as significant as the computer chip.' the only solution i see is nuclear, but the general public is too timid to embrace Gen3/4 nuclear plants yet.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By blaster5k on 7/10/2007 2:11:17 PM , Rating: 3
I completely agree. Nuclear is the best option we have to fight climate change, but yet so many environmentalists refuse to consider it.

The problem I see with all the renewables is the amount of land area they take to generate a significant amount of power. Sure, there are deserts and such where you could throw this stuff, but if you want to build enough to make a real difference, you're going to ruin habitats and screw with nature in other ways.

Nuclear produces more power for the amount of space than pretty much anything we can do today -- and it's even affordable. Virtually all the pollution is contained and manageable (most of the U.S. nuclear waste stockpiles are from creating high grade plutonium for weapons programs -- not power plants). With each generation of designs, they keep getting safer and safer. The generation IV designs look especially promising.

One of these days, "environmentalists" will wake up and realize that nuclear power is the only way we can realistically put a dent in emissions.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Tsuwamono on 7/10/2007 2:40:23 PM , Rating: 1
The reason they are against it is because its good now but bad down the road. Although if we dont do something now there wont be a down the road to worry about lol. I think Nuclear is the best option to buy us time to figure out Fission.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By blaster5k on 7/10/2007 2:58:37 PM , Rating: 2
I think you mean fusion. Lots of money has been spent over the years trying to produce a working fusion reactor without much success. It remains to be seen if it will ever be a viable concept. Some people think it might be a hundred years before we overcome a lot of the issues with it. Fission is quite sustainable anyhow -- especially with reprocessing and breeder reactors. Supposedly, the fuel supply will last longer than the sun will.


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Terberculosis on 7/10/2007 4:09:28 PM , Rating: 2
http://www.iter.org/

I think 100 years is a bit of an overestimate


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Ringold on 7/10/2007 6:32:11 PM , Rating: 2
It's being built in France. Doesn't bode well.
Notice the artists rendering on the home page. It doesn't exist yet.
Even when it's completed, completion doesn't mean successful operation.
Even when it's succesfully operated, that doesn't mean commercial viability.
Commercial viability doesn't mean "Fusion power plants in every back yard!"
I wouldn't count on ITER or fusion in general to save the day any time soon..


RE: 640 acres is a lot of land
By Chernobyl68 on 7/10/2007 6:07:28 PM , Rating: 2
pretty sure we already have fisson fugured out! :p