http://www.newenergyworldnetwork.com/renewable-energy-news/by-technology/solar/southwest-solar-technologies-develops-largest-solar-dish-turbine-in-north-america.html
US solar technology developer Southwest Solar Technologies (SST) has commissioned the largest solar dish in North America, one of the largest in the world, to build a solar power generator three times more powerful than other dish designs.
With a diameter of 75ft, SST anticipates that the latest solar collector will generate three times the level of power of conventional dish designs, and plans to test its power output in the second half of the year.
The company initially developed the solar dish turbine concept with support from the US government, a scalable and non-intermittent renewable energy technology that does not require the large volume of water that solar thermal projects often demand.
Prior efforts by developers to use turbines on solar dishes have failed to reach commercial success due to low efficiency and high turbine costs relative to the size of smaller projects.
But SST said the large size of its latest dish will optimise the turbine generator that it is developing with Brayton Energy, with costs balancing out as the power yield increases.
The three-year-old company is already piloting a smaller solar dish turbine system at the Southwest Solar Research Park in Phoenix, Arizona.