Solar power has bright future in sunny Alice

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By ERWIN CHLANDA
 
Private and public solar power  installations in Alice Springs are now producing the equivalent of electricity needed by 600 average homes here.
About one-third of this came on stream last week with the opening of the Uterne power station (pictured), on a 4.5 hectare site near the National Transport Hall of Fame.
Half of its $6.6m cost was paid by the Federal Government’s $94m Solar Cities program.
The American owner, SunPower Corp, based in San Jose, California, through its Australian branch, has a 20 year deal to sell electricity to the Northern Territory Government’s PowerWater.
It won’t disclose the price it is paying for the power but says it’s not much dearer than electricity made with gas.
Uterne – it means “bright, sunny day” in Arrernte – is the country’s largest tracking solar power system.
It has 254 “trackers” – flat racks each of which carry 12 high-effciency PV panels.
The trackers are mounted on shafts tilted on a fixed angle of 20 degrees towards the north, the ideal angle for Alice Springs, but oscillating east to west to always face the sun as it tracks across the sky.
This boosts productivity by 30% compared with fixed PV panels.
The plant will be saving 1564 tons of CO2 emissions a year, says SunPower.
All this makes for interesting back-of-the-envelope calculations.
Each tracker provides enough power for one average home, give or take a bit.
Dividing the $6.6m cost by the 254 trackers puts the cost of each tracker at around $26,000.
If you’re handy with a welder you could do it for much less. The simplicity of the design is truly inspiring!
Prof Ray Wills, CEO of the Sustainable Energy Association, who attended Uterne’s opening, says PV panels are getting cheaper all the time.
At current electricity costs you can pay off a plant in eight years. The PV panels have a life of 25 years.
Alice Springs has an average of 9.6 hours of sunshine per day.
In the last 56 years the area has averaged just 63 cloudy days a year.
So far the other solar power generators in The Alice are the plants at the airport and on the roof of the Crowne Plaza Hotel, and 400 householders who’ve put panels on their homes.

1 COMMENT

  1. Wow, environmental vandalism of the kind supported by the Greens. Large parcels of land cleared for solar panels and not a word from this group of so-called environmentalists. Yes, solar in Alice is a fantastic way forward at the cost of our natural beauty. I say NO! This is in its truest form environmental vandalism. Put them on rooftops. No more environmental damage to our magnificient countryside.

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