Spain's Big Solar Collector Tower

The world's largest solar tower for collecting and concentrating solar energy went online in Seville, Spain at the end of April. Called the PS20, the plant has a capacity of 20 megawatts and can power 10,000 homes.

The whole array is made up of 1,255 mirrors, each about 1,291 square feet, that all focus the sun onto a 531-foot tower. The concentrated heat boils water, creating steam, which turns a turbine to generate electricity.

This is the second solar tower to go into service in Spain and is twice as large as the original. Spain plans to put a total of 300MW of solar-thermal complexes into service by 2013. Not all will be towers, of course. Parabolic troughs are planned as well--they are smaller and generate more power, but the towers are faster and cheaper to build and install.

Spain is now the world's second-largest photovoltaic producer and may now be the world's largest concentrated solar producer as well.

For more information, check out the Abengoa site (makers of the tower) at this link.

And watch this short video showing how the tower operates: