NUCLEAR GIANT ON SOLAR POWER

Areva Says Solar Thermal Market May Increase 30-Fold by 2020
Mark Chediak and Alex Morales (w/Francois de Beaupuy,Todd White and Benedikt Kammel), February 9, 2010 (Bloomberg News via BusinessWeek)

"Areva SA of France predicts the global use of solar-thermal power will grow by about 30-fold this decade, a forecast that spurred the world’s largest maker of nuclear reactors to buy a California-based equipment maker.

"[Areva may have paid more than $200 million to acquire Ausra though terms of the deal were not disclosed]. The technology, which typically uses curved mirrors to focus sunlight to generate electricity, will be installed on plants with 20,000 megawatts of power potential by 2020…That compares with about 625 megawatts today…"

click to enlarge

"The deal was similar to recent purchases in the industry and indicate how traditional energy companies are branching into green power by acquiring competitors and using subsidies.

"Siemens AG, Europe’s largest engineering company, agreed last year to a $418 million purchase of Beit Shemesh, Israel- based Solel Solar Ltd. Abengoa SA, also an engineering company, is building 13 solar-thermal plants in Spain that will benefit from consumer subsidies for clean energy…"

Ausra's first U.S. installation. (click to enlarge)

"The technology provided by Ausra involves focusing sunlight to heat liquids to generate heat and steam used to drive a turbine. Areva wants to use Ausra’s solar-thermal equipment to build projects for independent power producers, utilities and industrial customers…[and] will target markets including southwestern U.S., Europe and the Middle East.

"The U.S. Department of Energy is ramping up research into what´s also called “concentrated solar power,” funding almost 30 projects and working with companies including New York-based Alcoa Inc. and Spain’s Abengoa with the aim of making the technology competitive in the baseload power market by 2020…Bloomberg New Energy Finance has forecast the installed base to grow to as much as 34,000 megawatts worldwide by 2020, exceeding [Areva’s] estimate…"