FollowSouthwest Solar Technologies Inc. announced today the successful on-sun testing and proof of concept of a highly advanced solar-turbine power system being developed by the Company. The full-scale prototype test was the first operational validation of the integrated system, which uses a large parabolic solar dish with mirrors to concentrate the sun’s energy to power an air-based open cycle turbine to produce electricity.
This milestone field test was conducted in Phoenix using the Company’s 320-square-meter solar concentrating dish, the largest solar dish in North America. The dish delivered thermal energy in the form of 2000 “suns” of concentrated sunlight into its advanced high-temperature solar thermal receiver. Inside this receiver compressed air was superheated, and that superheated air was used to power a high-speed turbine alternator and produce electrical power.
