The Ashalim power station is a concentrated solar

power station A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid. Many p ...

in the

Negev The Negev or Negeb (; he, הַנֶּגֶב, hanNegév; ar, ٱلنَّقَب, an-Naqab) is a desert and semidesert region of southern Israel. The region's largest city and administrative capital is Beersheba (pop. ), in the north. At its southe ...

desert A desert is a barren area of landscape where little precipitation occurs and, consequently, living conditions are hostile for plant and animal life. The lack of vegetation exposes the unprotected surface of the ground to denudation. About on ...

near the

kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...

Ashalim Ashalim ( he, אֲשָׁלִים) is a small community settlement in southern Israel. Located in the Negev desert about 35 km south of Be'er Sheva and on the eastern side of Nahal Besor, the largest stream in the Negev, it falls under the ju ...

, south of the district city of

Be'er Sheva Beersheba or Beer Sheva, officially Be'er-Sheva ( he, בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע, ''Bəʾēr Ševaʿ'', ; ar, بئر السبع, Biʾr as-Sabʿ, Well of the Oath or Well of the Seven), is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

. It consists of three plots with three different technologies the station combines 3 kinds of energy:

solar thermal energy Solar thermal energy (STE) is a form of energy and a technology for harnessing solar energy to generate thermal energy for use in industry, and in the residential and commercial sectors. Solar thermal collectors are classified by the United St ...

photovoltaic Photovoltaics (PV) is the conversion of light into electricity using semiconducting materials that exhibit the photovoltaic effect, a phenomenon studied in physics, photochemistry, and electrochemistry. The photovoltaic effect is commercially us ...

energy, and natural gas. Ashalim Plot A (Negev Energy) is a 121 megawatt

parabolic trough A parabolic trough is a type of solar thermal collector that is straight in one dimension and curved as a parabola in the other two, lined with a polished metal mirror. The sunlight which enters the mirror parallel to its plane of symmetry is foc ...

plant with 4.5 hours of

thermal energy storage Thermal energy storage (TES) is achieved with widely different technologies. Depending on the specific technology, it allows excess thermal energy to be stored and used hours, days, months later, at scales ranging from the individual process, ...

. The Ashalim Plot B (Megalim) hosts a

solar power tower A solar power tower, also known as 'central tower' power plant or 'heliostat' power plant, is a type of solar furnace using a tower to receive focused sunlight. It uses an array of flat, movable mirrors (called heliostats) to focus the sun's ra ...

. It has an installed capacity of 121 megawatts, concentrating 50,600 computer-controlled heliostats enough to power 120,000 homes. Electricity production commenced in September 2019, producing 320 GWhr of energy per year. The project was a joint venture between

Brightsource BrightSource Energy, Inc. is an Oakland, California based, corporation that designs, builds, finances, and operates utility-scale solar power plants. Greentech Media ranked BrightSource as one of the top 10 environmental technology, greentech star ...

and

Alstom Alstom SA is a French multinational rolling stock manufacturer operating worldwide in rail transport markets, active in the fields of passenger transportation, signalling, and locomotives, with products including the AGV, TGV, Eurostar, Avelia ...

. The station was the tallest solar power tower in the world at a height of 260 meters including the boiler but was recently surpassed by the 262.44 meter tall solar power tower at the

Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park is a solar park spread over a total area of 77 km2 in Saih Al-Dahal, about 50 kilometers south of the city of Dubai. It is one of the world's largest renewable projects based on an independent powe ...

. Ashalim Plot C is a 30MW photovoltaic plant, commissioned in 2018, one year before the CSP plants. In 2019

EDF Renewables EDF Renewables (formerly ''EDF Renouvelables'') is a wholly owned subsidiary of the French utility EDF Group, specializing in renewable energy production. As an integrated operator, the Group develops and finances the construction of renewable en ...

won a tender for another NIS 150 ($43) million PV plant at a record low price of 8.68 agorot (3 cents) per kilowatt hour.

Reasons for building the power station

According to a press release of the

National Infrastructure Minister of Israel The Ministry of Energy ( he, משרד האנרגיה) is the Israeli government ministry responsible for energy and water infrastructure. The ministry has changed names several times since its establishment. The ministerial post was established in ...

, the establishment has several motivations: # Economic motivation: reducing imports thus balancing the trade and releasing foreign currency. # Political motivation: reducing strategic dependence on foreign energy sources. # Environmental motivation: reducing contamination levels. # Scientific motivation: pushing forward local technology and science, adapting new technologies from abroad. Ashalim above.jpg Ashalim_Power_Station.jpg Brigthsource Tower Ashalim 3.jpg

Cost concerns

The

concentrated solar power Concentrated solar power (CSP, also known as concentrating solar power, concentrated solar thermal) systems generate solar power by using mirrors or lenses to concentrate a large area of sunlight into a receiver. Electricity is generated when ...

project in Ashalim was announced in 2008 and awarded in a competitive auction 2012 at NIS0.79 ($0.22) per kilowatt hour for Plot B - that is almost a factor of 9 compared to the PV stations tendered in 2019 at the same spot (see above). Similarly, the project on Plot A at NIS 0.76 per kWh, but including 4.5 hours of molten salt storage, delivers four times more expensive power than the results of tenders for solar plus 4 hours of storage awarded at the beginning of 2021 at NIS0.17/kWh ($0.054) to be delivered by 2023.

References

External links

Weizmann Institute of Science - Center for Energy Research

Megalim Solar power construction and commissioning

Take a tour of Ashalim Power Station
{{Portalbar, Israel, Renewable energy Solar power stations in Israel Solar power stations Solar thermal energy

Reasons for building the power station

Cost concerns

See also

References

External links