Excessive salt might ruin the taste of your food, but when it comes to solar energy, plenty of salt seems to be very good news- at least for the folk in California. Using a technology that will harness power through the sun and molten-salt, Solar Reserve, a California based solar firm intends to generate power round the clock in a green and clean fashion. The site chosen for this project is Rice, a town in San Bernadino County of California and the planned plant will have a 12-foot pedestal to which a total of 17,500 24 x 28 feet heliostats will be placed surrounding the Solar Power Tower. In a technology that is fast gaining popularity, heat from the sun will be concentrated and used to generate power.

The heat reflected from the vast set of heliostats onto the tower will be used to melt the4.4 million gallons of molten salt on top of the 100 meter tower. This molten salt will drive the attached turbines to generate power and to convert all that solar power into useful electricity. While this is not the first project to use molten salt, SolarReserve claims that their special technique of using synthetic oil along with the salt will make their plant 3-times more efficient than others before it.

So when can we see the plan at Rice operational? If all goes well the California can expect a salty tinge added to their electricity by 2013!

Goodcleantech