A Test Of Nevada’s Solar Tower Project Torched Over A Hundred Birds

In what ’s wrick into a public relations headache for the solar diligence , news has emerged that a recent trial of the 110 - megawatt Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project in Nevada result in some 130 birds catching fervidness , when they flew into an area of extremely hard solar energy .

As KCET ’s Rewire isreporting , the incident happened last calendar month , but the news program is only emerging now . According to Rudy Evenson , Deputy Chief of Communications for Nevada Bureau of Land Management in Reno , the birds were likely drawn to a glow created by the concentrated solar energy above the task ’s lone pillar .

Asnotedby E&E newsman Phil Taylor , plants like this one are a huge trouble for bird . He line the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System , a like but larger works in California ’s Mojave Desert :

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The 45 - history “ mogul towers ” strike with sunshine mull by 350,000 heliostat mirror spread across an area four times the sizing of New York ’s Central Park . receiver atop the towers heat to nearly 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit , boiling water to rick turbines that crank out 392 megawatt — power for more than 100,000 family .

This vivid heat would incinerate any bird that fly within the “ flux field ” between the mirrors and the towers .

The low Crescent Dunes industrial plant includes 17,500 heliostat mirrors that collect and focus the sun ’s thermal energy to heat molten salt flowing through a 54o - animal foot ( 16 meter ) tugboat .

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Rewire describes the recent incident in Nevada :

According to Evenson , workers testing the plant strike approximately a third of the projection ’s ten thousand mirrors to focus sun on a head 1,200 feet above the background , approximately twice the tallness of the power tugboat at Crescent Dunes .

The test take off at 9:00 a.m. on January 14 , Evenson told Rewire . By 10:30 , biologists working on the situation began noticing what have become cognise as “ streamers , ” trail of smoke and water vapor induce by birds infix the field of concentrated solar vim ( a.k.a . “ solar flux ” ) and catch fire .

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By the time the exam ended for the daylight at 3:00 p.m. , life scientist had reckon 130 such “ streamers . ” A subsequent trial run on January 15 reduced the bit of mirrors aim at the focal point above the tower , said Evenson , and that apparently stop the injuries to birds .

The result mitigation procedures , which admit reposition the plant ’s mirrors to reduce the loudness of solar flux , has take into account the subsequent testing of the plant life , and with less danger to wildlife .

Looking in front , and given the future potential of these concentrated arrays , the solar industriousness is going to have to tread very cautiously . Killing or maim most bird specie , whether it ’s measured or inadvertent , is illegal under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act .

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