A new way to turn the sun’s power into energy | The Edge 

Rocky Ford, Colorado, USA, has a working unit of heat generation that they built in the median of a highway outside of town. It uses a liquified sulphur heat transfer system to heat a boiler that runs a steam generator. It is a closed system on the heat generating side as well as on the steam boiler. The station is fully enclosed and over 10 miles from town.

There is a city in Colorado that uses a heat gathering system to generate electricity. It works well enough that they are fully self powered and have paid for the cost of the system by selling power to other cities.

I like this lady's interviewing technique. Seems elegantly simple, just listen thoughtfully while nodding your head and then when the person you're interviewing stops talking repeat the last few words he said and wait for him to say something else. Brilliant.

I am from India, when I was just 14, I noticed that my mother used a box like contraption, coated black on the inside with something & had a funny glass like adjustable lid. It was called the "Solar Cooker". She would mix up the spices, vegetables or meat & ghee put it in a special container. Then she would do the same with rice, lentils or beans. Cover the containers, put them in this box like thing, adjust the glass lid at an angle & wait. In about an hours time the meal would be ready, a little longer in winters. This gave my family to have more time together. The food tasted just as good as if it was prepared in the traditional manner. This technology was being used in India way way back. I am 63 now & still many households use the "Solar Cooker" even today.

Fantastic! I was evaluating this concept back in 2000 and I am glad to see it is making some headway. Inflatable mirrors are by far the cheapest because you reduce the large costs on mirrors. Main downside is it is resistance to windy locations. It will work well for sure. The balloon around the mirror keeps dust off the mirror but cuts down on light efficiency slightly. So Nice to see it working!

The largest solar furnace is at Odeillo in the Pyrénées-Orientales in France, opened in 1970. It employs an array of plane mirrors to gather sunlight, reflecting it onto a larger curved mirror. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_furnace

the Spanish company Abengoa has built many multi megawatt plants all over the world, several years ago, using thermal heat from the sun.

I see some people don't quite get it. I admit that I'm a more visual person and the video did not demonstrate significance in cost. Cost advantage was only briefly mentioned during the video and could have been easily missed. People learn in different ways and diverting their attention more toward cost of manufacture needs to be done.

It does have a rather large footprint... But that is also true for a big scale solar reflector farm. One benefit I see is that you won't have birds killed by a solar death-ray :)

My brother did this for University and in Australia they have a large scale power plant. I always called these a solar furnace - unless I'm misunderstanding something. Basically my brother had an array of 50 mirrors and he was boiling a trash can full of water. As for the large scale power-plant in Australia, they have a pipe of water that they heat and use that steam to spin turbines. Some people also do this with black aluminum pipes where the sun's heat is absorbed into the black aluminum and then the hot air is used to heat houses. The large bag/tank looks like it would be expensive to fix - I wonder how it deals with Hail stones.

Excellent video, thanks for posting, much appreciated. New sub : )

I was going to make a sick burn about Archimedes but it's actually kind of cool what they're doing I particularly liked the use of refrigerant

Awesome! Just waiting for the roof shingle version before I buy.

Finally.. i've been thinking for years now why noone ever build a giant solar-laser to generate energy. Glad it's happening at last. :)

This is awsome! This is the kind of technology we need to pursue.

I remember something similar running in Spain a few years ago, so although it's definitely nifty, classifying it as new is a bit too much.

Why do folks feel compelled to post negative comments about great things like this? And why care if CNBC produces interesting videos for free? It's not like their demanding payment or forcing you to watch. What's revolutionary about this is not the technique but the portability, applications and concentrated power. Yes, we can cook a meal or light a fire or do lots of crazy things with a magnifying glass but providing power for industrial and commercial uses on a grand scale? The biggest applications are desalination plants and solar thermal power plants leading to the cheapest electricity in the world. Posters may "know" this is "nothing new" but firms from China, Saudi Arabia, Spain, etc disagree. What's telling (and sad) is that all this innovation is occurring outside the US where green lobbies have successfully prevented the building of small, solar-powered desalination plants for various reasons ("it wouldn't help" "too expensive" "We can solve the problem with conservation")

The guy literally said the technology isn't new, and the comments section is full of people saying this isn't new technology...

How much power will that put out? I look at the size and that is fine. But tell me what it will do.

It's the title that's misleading, probably on purpose (click bait). The man in the video even says so about right in the middle.

If you want to make a feasible thermal device that utilizes sunlight you have to think multidimensional in terms of energy input, energy stabilization, energy distribution and energy storage. The system you're building has to function in conjunction with other natural forces to have a consistent energy output and a way to store excess energy.

Thought this looked familiar! GoSun is a brand portable solar food cookers that use this technology quite remarkably.

"this thermal energy can be turned into electricity?" Is that a serious question?

I'm a bit skeptical about this. I did a quick calculation and i don't think this contraption can generate enough energy to be considered useful. Assuming the hoops are 8m diameter, spaced 9 meters each and there are 18 hoops, that makes up for a rectangular area of (18-1)x9x8 = 1224 m^2. Make it 1500 m^2. On average, in a sunny location, the radiant energy input is 200W per square meter. Again, make it 250 for an optimistic estimate. The total energy input for the device is 1500*250=375000W = 375KW. The amount of energy required to evaporate 1Kg of water (at 1 atm) is 2256.4 KJ, so with this power input, assuming 100% efficiency, the entire rack produces 375/2256.4 = 0.166 Kg of water per second (quite not enough for driving even a small turbine)

Wow, I'm surprised nobody thought of this new way until 2017! CNBC is clearly at the forefront of new technologies being invented, I'm impressed!

You reinvented the wheel- WOW!

Combine this with hyper loop transport technology and you have all the positive. A total win win !

Interesting... but does it also work when its cloudy?? I think traditional solar panels also produce when its cloudy...

Great job guys

Wow, people are really awesome.

traditional way for multiplying solar power to A considerable level.👍

Hi , i want details about this project, can anyone provide me details?

Can someone explain how it work?

What is the current update

Basically large solar cookers

How is it better than traditional Cilinder-parabolic CSP plants?

You guys, can you come up with a cheaper way of storing this energy to be used for instance at night or during peak days? Storing energy could be the hardest part.

Good idea but What will happened when dust particals cover the lance. This is the major problem we are facing in solar energy. Pls elaborate. Thanks

When was this new? A few decades ago?

i think the idea is to use a cheapo mirror technology, might be not that bad

People explaining this was old technology obviously did not see the video where the guy said it is not new technology but are using it to create smart technology. Do people just read titles of videos and go straight to the comments?

It is not a new way to make usable energy. In 1901 someone made a steam engine that used a parabolic dish to concentrate the sunlight. It got a lot of interest but when coal prices went down nobody cared about it.

In India we are already using it for cooking food at shirdi temple.

LOVE this New Technology! If they ever DO get it to market, and it takes hold, I would be a player for it, 65%cheaper than the current rate is NO laughing matter!

Wow!!! Awesome, is this scaleable

This is very old tech. A high tech version of this was on the roof of the IL agriculture building in the 90s.

*Solar panels are winning,* because people can use them on their house. This system will be only useful to investors who can build expensive operations.

Dude can you be more specific how much voltage and current you can supply for steel plant per day

that system can be engineered with 80-90-% less mental in the system that holds the lenses saving more money and using less space.

It is typically referred to as the sun's energy. Power is the time rate of energy. The media getting off to the wrong start again.

Is there a chance the track could bend?

This is a very good idea. On a very large scale it will make a lot of sense. The dairy and industrial uses are interesting as well. The problem I have with this type of technology is that it requires a tracking system. Lots of moving parts that will break down. Tracking does vastly improve efficiency but it requires more maintenance as well. This system is ideal for terraforming earth. Turning deserts into oaises. I imagine an ocean water pipeline running inland to a desert in any continent. A large array of these would either distill or make electricity to do reverse osmosis to make plenty of fresh water from the ocean. The sea salt can be harvested and minerals can be mined from the sea water to help to pay for this system. We have a great planet here. Let's practice making an uninhabitable places on earth habitable so that we will be really good at making a planet habitable. Then we will perhaps be up for the challenge of Mars or the moon. They have a whole lot of challenges though

Sandia Labs had a parabolic trough back in the early 1970's.

At 1:36 he says that they have engineered technology that has been around for some time, just making it more efficient.

This is essentially a giant evacuated solar tube. Lots of people heat their hot water with the small 2 in solar tubes.

This idea of intensifying sun rays to generate heat is already in application in Shirdi Sai Baba Mandir in India for cooking food. It was also documented by Discovery Channel in mega Kitchen India.

I saw an advertisment in a 1950's magazine that cooked food using parabolic mirrors. Where is the new Technology?

Where are the measured results from the prototype?

Wait till when there’s a rainy day 😂😂

Such concepts can do desalinization with no ultra expensive pumps and reverse osmosis filters and can produce electricity rather than consume it.

Why not use this as a hyperloop as well??

could get the panels of from about 20 of them big screen TV that everybody is throwing out and do the same

So funny that the reporter is able to explain that thing better than the sales rep or engineer...

cost per watt???

After reading some more and mailing various scientists we concluded that the whole construction must rotate 2000 RPM in order for the heat transfer to accumulate to a stable plasma that can be converted into electricity. Can anyone confirm this? If this is the case then wouldn't the vibrations from the spin cause the ground to become unstable and shift the construction which in turn would prevent the sun from reaching the heat receiver?

Keeping heat down means no more birds catching ablaze

You don't have to turn the sun's power into energy. That's why it's called power, it's already energy.

Wow, I had this in my head as an idea of making use of the suns energy more efficiently, now i'm watching this!!! WTH!

Waiting for their segment on some guy inventing the wheel.

Put a plastic case around the trough: increase the costs: name it as a startup: success!

What if its cloudy

I sent an email to company, called many times but nobody replies. I searched information on internet and i found that 26 people are working in the company. They need a Secretary!!! The guy in the video says that 55 percent cheaper, soooo how much 1 Mw system costs? Even in the website no detailed info.

For most the video you're only seeing a partially made trough of mirrors without any mirrors.,..

Well at least he was honest about it being old tech repackaged. No idea how this could be 55% cheaper then a mere trough mirror, but if that is a legitimate claim then by all means get these things going.

If you are going to distill Fukushima water, this will do it for less cost than many other methods.

I think base on size this version is better since solar concentration technology that uses flat parabolic mirror really eat up space. probably maintenance cost can be cut down. an innovative way of thinking. I amazed

I am wearing a suit right now in a fancy building in Switzerland and I have some 1920's technology here....etc. LOL. Were do I sign up? Maybe if you had a nicer suit or if you were in Tahiti the product could be an even newer way.

Make a thermal wind chimney

Don't they have something similar in the Arizona desert that concentrate sunlight to run Sterling engine generators?

Now make this a motor for a vehicle and you could reach speed of light since magnifying light makes it even hotter and thus making the motor power faster as it heats up sounds crazy I know

Good

what's the name of the company??????

I dont get why everybody is saying this is not new technology he said in the video this is old technology.

This must be how the gosun solar oven works.😊

thank u for all the teachers who destroyed my physics and chemistry

A mirror with a circular cross-section, as shown here, will not focus the sun's rays to a single point. It has to be parabolic to do this.

I don't think that this will scale to 100s of mwh but if they can make it cheap enough, it might be a good niche product

No captions, no watch. RU-vid's computer generated CC are one hell of a lot better than no captions at all.

I think the solar plant was way better in the movie "Sahara" with Mathew McConaughey. :P exempt from the bad stuff.

Sun heats chimney cause ing chimney to spin, cool air enters in at bottom below ground level heating by sun (magnified) turn hot air out with venture effect spinning chimney like wind turbine

Goes without saying that something a lot lot smaller could suddenly turn up.

How efficient

oh the negative comments. its an innovation! the mirror surface needs to be a parabola. these guys have cleverly enclosed the flexible mirror surface inside a round cylinder so that by turning the cylinder it efficiently deforms the mirror into a parabola at optimal angles to the sun. they have made an age old concept better more efficient AND 55% cheaper that current mirror focusing systems (or so they say) perhaps the neg comment posters should re-watch and wonder why non of us thought of this first and rushed to the patent office.

Call it the hyper solar booster loop

"A new way"?, are you kidding me?.

I wonder how many "misleading text" reports RU-vid is ignoring.

yes...we can use giant magnifying glass to heat steel, how genius of you

Looks like this might solve the dead bird problem solar has.

The interviewer seems completely out o f her comfort zone!

Got a lot of unknown geniuses here.