in a recent article in horizon, the european union research and innovation magazine, benedict o’donnell explores the potential of concentrated solar power (csp) to provide energy in remote parts of the world, particularly sub-saharan africa and the middle east, as new methods of cooling plants is developed.

o’donnell noted that costs of csp are coming down with the eu focusing on fulfilling its directive (established in 2009) to ensure that one-fifth of its energy come from renewable sources by 2020. but, csp plants “consume enough water to drain an olympic-sized swimming pool” in order to stay cool, which is a problem that will be amplified in desert environments.

with that in mind, engineers across the eu are exploring alternative technologies and systems to limit the water requirements for csp plants. for example, plants are utilizing air ventilation methods during the day with water cooling constrained to “sparse sprinkles” at peak hours.

kelvion holding gmbh in germany is developing a fan that would match the airflow and static pressure needs of individual plants. test results have indicated a 10 percent increase in efficiency, but there are concerns fans of the scale that plants would require have vibration and noise concerns.

in addition to cooling the plants, water is also an important resource for cleaning the solar panels, especially with the blowing dust that is natural for a desert. planners have used vegetation and fencing on the edges of the plant to try and catch dust and the german engineers are also working on a technique to recycle runoff water.

the goal of all this work is to try and “reduce the water footprint of concentrated solar plants by more than 70 percent in coming years.”

read more about concentrated solar power and its potential at http://horizon-magazine.eu/article/quenching-thirst-concentrated-solar-power_en.html.