Alternative Energy Partners (AEGY) responds to California's licensing of world's largest solar thermal plant

MERRITT ISLAND, USA: Gary Reed, CEO of Alternative Energy Partners, a provider of comprehensive alternative energy solutions, has responded positively to the week's news that California has licensed the world's largest solar thermal plant.

Last week, New York Times blogger Todd Woody reported that California regulators had licensed the Blythe Solar Power Project, a 1,000-megawatt complex to be constructed in the Mojave Desert.

The power plant will not only reduce California's environmental impact, but result in significant job creation. The article also noted that, if the Blythe complex is approved by the United States Bureau of Land Management in October, it will be the first big solar project licensed and built on federal land.

Reed says: "There is little doubt as to the strength and increasing appeal of solar thermal energy as an option for both governments and private organizations. The door is opening wider for states and the federal government to embrace the use of solar thermal energy, and an alternative energy provider, we support every step to make its use more commonplace."

The New York Times story reported that the Blythe Solar Power Project is designed to use parabolic troughs for solar energy collection. AEGY announced earlier this week that, through its subsidiary Sunarias, it is developing advanced solar thermal collector trough technology with materials that would allow not only for reduction in cost and manufacturing efficiency, but in shipping speed.

Ultimately, the new design would enhance the ability for those troughs to be easily transported to, and therefore incorporated in, solar thermal energy projects. In the press release earlier this week, Reed stated that preliminary indications were that the trough, which is AEGY's proprietary technology, may exceed 9000 BTUHs per trough.

Reed adds: "Massive projects like Blythe are the reason that it is important to innovate and improve on the design of a parabolic trough. AEGY is focused, not only on how to help incorporate alternative systems into daily life, but how to make it easier to do so.

"A trough [AEGY's proprietary trough technology] that not only improves efficient energy collection but may be manufactured at lower costs and transports well is what the industry has been waiting for."