Category Archives: Energy from the desert

Lack of US Transmission Lines

David Roberts writes about this in a series of posts on his new David Roberts writes about this in a series of posts on his new “Volts” mailing list. First he notes why this topic is important. As in many other places that want to add massive renewable capacity, people find out that good locationsContinue reading “Lack of US Transmission Lines”

Neom Helios Desert Energy Project

Desertec Industrial Initiative recently held a web seminar featuring Paul Van Son and Driss Beraho. The first short presentation by Son was about what the Desertec Industrial Initiative is up to lately. We learn that the vision now exceeds green electrons and has expanded to include green molecules. That is hydrogen made from renewable energyContinue reading “Neom Helios Desert Energy Project”

Desertec not Outdated

I just heard about Mr. Abdelmadjid Attar, since the North Africa Post reported about his views on the Desertec project. He is quoted like this: “The Desertec project is outdated. Let’s forget it,” Being of the opinion that the world is in urgent need of massive solar projects, including in the North African deserts, IContinue reading “Desertec not Outdated”

Nothing Wrong With EEG Payments Running Out After 20 Years

The German Law on Priority for Renewable Energy started out 20 years ago. The basic concept was paying a fixed price for renewable energy for 20 years. That price was calculated to make sure people could make a profit over those 20 years. Now that the first installations under that law are falling out ofContinue reading “Nothing Wrong With EEG Payments Running Out After 20 Years”

German Hydrogen Strategy

According to this Handelsblatt article by Klaus Stratman, the German Cabinet will approve the Hydrogen Strategy that has been discussed for some time now tomorrow. I have been writing lots of posts about hydrogen on this blog over the years. So I welcome the fact that Germany will put some effort in getting green hydrogenContinue reading “German Hydrogen Strategy”

DLD 2020 Bitcoin Energy Panel

There was some informed comment on how bitcoin mining helps with solving the climate emergency, as opposed to being a part of the problem. The conference for this panel was the “DLD Munich”, which means “Digital Life Design”. It was founded in 2005, is backed by a large German media company, and attracts a lotContinue reading “DLD 2020 Bitcoin Energy Panel”

Shade from Desert Solar Panels

This Bloomberg article describes one of the largest solar panel projects of the world, with a scale of 2 GW built in China. I learned from that article that putting large numbers of solar panels in an arid area has another benefit I wasn’t aware of. From the article: Shade provided by the project’s panelsContinue reading “Shade from Desert Solar Panels”

Mojave Desert Project

Good news from the United States: The Obama administration is coming up with a “Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan”, according to Carolyn Lochhead at the San Francisco Chronicle. That plan would make available up to 2,000 square miles of desert public land available for large scale solar development. Of course some “environmentalists” worried more aboutContinue reading “Mojave Desert Project”