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   Greg Egan (gregegansf@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:06:55 JST Greg Egan

   Concentrated solar photovoltaic, but the water that cools the PV modules is retained as a heat store, and some of the electricity drives a chiller to cool a second mass of water. The temperature difference drives a turbine, for ~17hrs of stored power.

   https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-31/raygen-resources-opens-new-solar-and-thermal-power-plant-carwarp/102798366

   • clacke likes this.
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     Greg Egan (gregegansf@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:06:57 JST Greg Egan

     in reply to

     • John Carlos Baez

     @johncarlosbaez

     It is both photovoltaic and thermal.

     https://www.pv-magazine-australia.com/2020/03/20/arena-boosts-funding-for-raygens-solar-hydro-power-plant/

     “The Melbourne-based startup generates renewable energy and large scale energy storage by focusing sunlight with a field of aligned mirrors or heliostats onto a tower-mounted receiver containing an array of PV Ultra modules made of gallium arsenide PV cells. The heat extracted from the PV Ultra modules is then stored as hot water in a reservoir acting as a store. The ability to co-generate electricity and heat, the latter a captured by-product, makes the whole facility highly efficient.”

     clacke likes this.
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     John Carlos Baez (johncarlosbaez@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:06:58 JST John Carlos Baez

     in reply to

     • waldi

     @waldi @gregeganSF - it sounds like it's not photovoltaic, i.e. does not use solar cells that convert light directly into electricity:

     "Unlike a traditional solar array, the Carwarp project uses an array of mirrors which are arranged to face a tower.

     Sunlight is concentrated at the top of the tower, heating up the solar modules that turns around a third of the captured sunlight into electricity."

     clacke repeated this.
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     waldi (waldi@chaos.social)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:06:59 JST waldi

     in reply to

     @gregeganSF The linked article clearly talks about mirrors and nowhere about photovoltaic.

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     Greg Egan (gregegansf@mathstodon.xyz)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:07:01 JST Greg Egan

     in reply to

     • waldi

     @waldi The people who built it will be surprised to learn that you know better than them, and that their photovoltaic modules are figments of their imagination.

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     waldi (waldi@chaos.social)'s status on Monday, 11-Sep-2023 01:07:02 JST waldi

     in reply to

     @gregeganSF Nothing on this installation is photovoltaic. This is a traditional sun to really hot matter conversion.