How do the capital costs of towers and troughs compare?
Towers have a unit capital cost advantage over troughs, which can be broken down into four distinct elements: • Glass: Flat glass mirrors are less expensive than curved glass mirrors. • Structural steel: Tower heliostats are mounted singly or in pairs, creating a low wind load and therefore requiring far less structural steel per square meter of mirror. • Pipes: A tower system contains far fewer heat-collecting pipes in its boiler because of the higher sunlight concentration ratios. Furthermore, tower piping is installed only at the central tower and not distributed throughout the field. In addition, trough systems require kilometers of header pipes for distribution of cold and hot oil to and from the working collector assemblies. • Civil works: Trough assemblies require sizable concrete foundations, and trenching and cabling throughout the solar field to bring power to the drive motors. The compact heliostats in a BrightSource tower systems do not require foundations and use minimal c
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