[amor de cosmos]

Solar thermal energy costs predicted to halve by 2020
By Giles Parkinson on 5 February 2013

Days after US Energy Secretary Stephen Chu promised that large scale solar PV would be cheaper than coal and gas before the end of the decade – and a commercial solar PV project in New Mexico appeared to deliver on that very prediction – comes a forecast that the other key solar technology, solar thermal, will also halve its costs over the same time period.

One of the world’s leading experts on concentrating solar thermal power (CSP) technologies, Dr Manuel Blanco, says the cost of dispatchable solar thermal energy will fall to just 12/kWh by 2020. Dispatchable means that the energy can be delivered when the energy is needed, not just when the sun shines. This is achieved with energy storage.

The current cost of solar thermal technologies is estimated by the industry itself at around 25c/kWh, and Blanco’s predictions accord with those of an industry study last year, which predicted costs of 12c/kWh to 13c/kWh could be reached. That, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, makes it comparable with the cost of new coal-fired power stations.

However, those predictions for solar thermal are well below predictions from the government’s official forecasts, the Bureau of Resource and Energy Economics, which predicts the technology will fall from current levels of around 30c/kWh to now lower than 20c/kWh by 2025. The solar thermal industry has already registered its disappointment with that assessment.

http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/sola...-halve-by-2020