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Air Force Base Installing 15 MW of Solar

August 11, 2010 | 3 Comments

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Phoenix – Even though the campaign to put solar on the white house so far hasn't made much headway, that doesn't mean that the U.S. government is not interested in solar. This was evidenced this week with the Arizona Public Service Co (APS) announcement that it is developing a 15-MW solar power plant at Luke Air Force base in Arizona.

According to the announcement APS will own and operate a new 15-MW PV power plant to be built at the base in Glendale, Arizona. SunPower Corp. will design and construct the solar plant that expected to come online in summer 2011. It will be the largest solar installation on U.S. government property, said APS.

Steps including environmental assessments, permitting and site preparation must be completed first if construction is to begin on time. If all goes according to plan, however, the companies say that they will start building the plant in January 2011.

The enormous 100-acre plant is going to be built on underutilized land on the base. A single-axis tracking system will be installed, which will allow the panels to follow the sun across the sky, capturing 25 percent more energy than if the panels were stationary, according to the company.

This is the second solar project collaboration for APS and Luke Air Force Base. In 2006, APS provided $1.5 million in incentives to reduce the cost of integrating a 375-kilowatt solar system into the Base Exchange's new roof.

Solar Energy

3 Reader Comments

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TheodoreSumrall

August 18, 2010

This technology is much more suited for climates such as Arizona where the sun shines almost every day and land is cheap allowing for a large surface area of land to be utilized economically. To power the White House would require an area almost as large as Lafayette Park (7 Acres).

Physics Professor Emeritus Howard Hayden's very informative and well-documented book, The Solar Fraud, provides data that shows you might get 50kW per acre. Assuming that the white house power bill is at least as big as that of the Vice President ($186,000/yr) then this calculates to 212 kW or 4 and 1/4 acres just for the solar cells. Throwing in things such as transformers, etc. and the fact that the White House probablly uses twice the amount of power the Washington D.C. Naval Observatory does (home of VP Biden) and a lot of White House employees are going to have to park somewhere else. I do not look for the White House going solar.

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2 of 3

TheodoreSumrall

August 18, 2010

http://www.amazon.com/Solar-Fraud-Energy-World-Second/dp/0971484546/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_2

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Mr_B

August 19, 2010

Yes, the Arizona desert is ideal for making use of photovoltaic solar energy. but the white house would not have to be covered in solar panels. No, some more intelligent engineering with thermal energy and energy efficiencies could bring down their power bill with solar energy... no panels required.

http://websolarsearch.com/

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