Jim Conca has written another fascinating piece over at Forbes.com looking at the Ivanpah solar facility in California – and its lackluster performance.
There is always the possibility the sun will begin cooperating down there in the California desert, but the larger point Conca makes is worth highlighting:
“At this level of operation, over 20 Ivanpahs (at a cost of $50 billion) would be needed to produce the 9 billion kWhs that a single nuclear reactor produced last year.”
He’s right.
According to the US EIA, Ivanpah produced 254,263 megawatt hours of electricity between January and August. Columbia Generating Station produced that much in nine and half days last month, with a much smaller carbon footprint.
Nuclear’s clean energy benefits and 90%+ capacity factor are essential to meeting ANY future carbon reduction goals.
Read Jim’s piece here:
(Post by John Dobken)