Project Y

RENEWABLE ENERGIES Almeria has an annual sunshine of 3,000 hours
and is the sunniest region in Europe – consequently it not only has a great
potential for vegetable farming but also for the use of solar power.
// PeTrA WeiSSeNbicHler
A
lmeriais the name of one
of eight provinces in Andalusia
located in the
south of Spain. This is the name of
the region but also of its capital. It’s
not for nothing that it derives from
Arabic ‘al-Mariyva’ as it is indeed
very special: It is close to the African
continent that strongly influences
its climate which is extremely
warm and very, very dry.
seMi-desert cliMate and
deli toMatoes
An almost unusual semi-desert
ecosystem exists in the inland of
this sunniest region in Europe.
Almond trees, olive gardens and
vegetable plantations are typical at
the South coast of Spain. It is also
called ‘Europe’s vegetable garden’.
Insiders know: “They produce the
absolutely best tomatoes far and wide
- very sweet, very small, very famous,
very tasty and above all, very expensive”
remembers Ralf Schöneberg,
Technical MD of Project Almeria.
“A kilogram of these tomatoes costs
about € 16. I probably will remember
this for a long while - but also the incredible
taste” the friendly engineer
comments with a smile.
He was the overall technical manager
for the construction of the
largest photovoltaic park in this region
and in all of Spain. Photovoltaic
sounds much more complicated
than it actually is as a solar park
does nothing else but convert solar
radiation into solar energy and sells
it to the local energy provider.
the verY Best in engineering
The solar power plant called ‘Sol
del Sur’ is located in the mountains
near the villages Nijar and Lucainea
about 40 km from the city of Almeria.
ALPINE-ENERGIE Deutschland
together with ARGE partners won
the contract to construct this huge
solar power plant.
The average annual production of a
solar power plants (taking all plants
into account) is about 200 kW. But
to get to this point requires enormous
know-how on renewable energies
and the very best in engineering.
The power plant was completed
in July 2008 after a construction
period of only seven months and
achieved an energy production of
almost 14.5 MWp. A single module
produces exactly 170 W when
compared with the total number of
modules installed. About 90,480
modules have been installed for
this project. It results in a saving of
17,580 tons in CO2 emissions per
year. The total energy production
per years is 20,690,000 KWh. This
is an enormous output considering
the fact that about 22 million KWh
of energy are sufficient to supply
about 6,000 (average) homes with
energy.
‘Sol del Sur’ required a lot of effort,
not only because of the difficult
ground level. About 100 worker,
a number of excavators, numerous
tractors, a few bulldozer and a
Unimog made it possible to set up
about 85,000 mono and polycrystalline
modules with a total surface
area of about 300,000 m2.
This was done for a reason: the sun
radiates to the earth in three hours
the same amount of energy that is
used by the entire world population
in one year.
research & develoPMent
since the 1980’s
Solar power stations of this and
similar kinds are not unusual in
Andalusia. This area not only offers
hospitality, flamenco and tropical
fruits. North of Almeria is also
the research area of ‘Plataforma Solar
de Ameria’ that focussed its research
and development on solar
energy since the 1980’s
The economic support of Andalusia
is a positive side effect of the construction
of these solar parks. They
unburden the environment, decentralise
the local supply of energy
and support the region’s independence.
//
Ü www.alpine-energie.com
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