Do you know what “grid parity” means?
When alternative energy sources and their generating infrastructure make so much electricity that they are at cost or cheaper than the cost of the electricity on the regular power grid, those alternative energy sources have achieved grid parity. This would be a wonderful thing – to have green technologies owning an equal share of the power grid. My wife and I used a company called Green Mountain Energy when we lived in Dallas, Texas – Green Mountain is a wind power company that adds it’s percentage to the power grid. It wasn’t quite a grid parity situation, obviously – but it felt good to be putting money towards the technology.
In a solar situation, a company called Acciona has just built a $367 million dollar solar farm. This massive living breathing animal generates 46 Megawatts of photovoltaic power, with a grand total of two hundred fifty thousand panels. This thing is amazing. How many homes do you think it’s capable of powering?
Thirty Thousand. Thirty thousand Portugese homes.
The press release from Acciona is here. Here’s a good article from OVI Magazine, and one from EcoGeek.
The OVI article you sight says the facility will power 30,000 homes, not the stated 30,000,000
Well, I guess I did! Thank Ben for pointing that out.
Comments are closed.