Technology:

Natural Gas May Be Worse For Climate Than Feared (kcet.org)

Solar Thermal plants like BrightSource's Ivanpah may
have a bigger greenhouse footprint than expected.
(Photo: Craig Dietrich/Flickr/Creative Commons License)

Natural gas has often been touted as an energy source that offers a cleaner-burning "bridge" away from other fossil fuels like coal and oil. However, recent studies of leakage from gas fields and production facilities suggest that natural gas use may be far more dangerous to the planet's climate than expected -- with potentially serious ramifications for solar thermal generating plants as well.

As a partial result of natural gas' recent low prices, some California solar plants have included a natural gas component to help generate power when the sun's not out. This is especially true of solar thermal power plants. Solar thermal plants generally use a heat-conducting "transfer fluid," heated by concentrated solar energy, to run turbines. One the sun goes down, that transfer fluid starts to cool. It can take some time the next morning for the sun to reheat that fluid to the point where it's hot enough to move the turbines again.

Just another reason to go with clean, renewable, baseload 24/7, 365 geothermal energy.

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