Abu Dhabi is not content to just sell you the oil that fuels your SUV; now its going to sell you sunshine to keep your lights on and power your electric car when the internal combustion engine goes the way of the buggy whip. Masdar, the oil-rich emirate’s $15 billion renewable energy venture, and Spanish technology company Sener on Wednesday announced a joint venture called Torresol Energy to build large-scale solar power plants in Australia, Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and the United States.
Torresol initially will invest $1.2 billion in three solar power plants to be built in Spain but the company is targeting the global “sunbelt” for future expansion. Masdar will take a 60 percent ownership stake in Torresol with Sener holding a 40 percent stake. A Torresol spokesman declined to reveal the dollar amount of the investment. A prime market for Torresol will be the U.S. desert Southwest, where companies like Ausra, BrightSource Energy, Solel and Abengoa Solar are competing for contracts with utilities PG&E (PCG), Arizona Public Service (PNW) and Southern California Edison (EIX). Torresol potentially could shake up that market, given its very deep pockets and ability to independently finance billion-dollar solar power plants.
The venture is just the latest move by Abu Dhabi to control what Masdar CEO Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber described to Green Wombat recently as “the whole value chain” of renewable energy, from research and development to manufacturing silicon for solar cells to the large-scale deployment of green technology.
The irony is too rich to leave unsaid: A leading oil producer invests billions in carbon-free energy while a leading consumer of fossil fuels – the United States – continues to subsidize Big Oil while while offering only tepid support for green technology. It is inevitable that climate change will foster the rise of renewable energy – the only question is which countries and companies will profit from the new energy economics. It is entirely possible that the U.S. will trade energy dependence of one kind – on Middle East oil – for another – on Middle East and European solar technology – in the era of global warming. It’s no coincidence that most of the solar energy companies with contracts to build utility-scale power plants in California and the Southwest have overseas roots – Ausra hails from Australia, BrightSource was founded by American-Israeli pioneer Arnold Goldman, Solel is based in Israel and Abengoa is headquartered in Spain.
Torresol plans to build solar power plants using a technology it calls a Central Tower Receiver system. It’s similar to technology used by competitors like BrightSource in that fields of mirrors called heliostats focus the sun’s rays on tower that contains a receiver. In this case the receiver is filled with salt which when heated vaporizes water to create steam that drives an electricity-generating turbine. The company says it intends to have 500 megawatts of solar electricity online by 2012.
Green Wombat 
It’s unfortunate that large energy producers are the ones investing in green technology. Ultimately, they want to stay in the distribution business, and that’s why they’re spending this money. It should think it would be a lot more efficient if green energy were produced on an individual basis (e.g. solar panels and wind turbines on rooftops). Unfortunately, from the public’s point of view, it isn’t their problem to fix.
It’s a PR stunt by Abu Dhabi. That’s all.
We all know that global warming is a fact, not fiction. For the next 5 years, the only sector that will have exponential growth is alternative energy. For example, technology has been capped out and reached to a matured stage in this economic boom. Our society has been more depended on electricity than ever before, therefore the demand for electricity is not going to decrease period. So many other foreign countries are investing heavily in alternative energy, especially in solar. We as Americans need to foresee our future. We can’t just depend on foreign oil..! We need to invest in our future. There is an old saying that “what you have planted today is what you’ll get down the road”. It’s that simple. Wake up America..!!!
Sam, so it’s only a PR stunt, great…tell me that when gas and heating oil are both $5 per gallon.
Why would America think long term? We only concern ourselves with the next quarters profit report or the next term in office. To really fix the problem would take some short term pain but our instant gratification society will not allow that.
I, for one, am grateful that the oil nations are reinvesting money (our money!) to provide us with electricity. It’s too bad American companies would rather drill than to invest the way these forward thinking Middle Eastern countries do. The future belongs to these new leaders of the business world.
Todd Woody slacked off a bit on his ‘research’ for the article. And his bias shows quite clearly – …the US – continues to subsidize Big Oil… How would that be, by taxing ‘excess’ or ‘obscene’ profits? Google ‘Carter Administration’ – has been done!
The ‘Central Tower Receiver’ system is not exactly new. I read about it in a book by Prof. John O’M. Bockris, (Flanders University, Adelaide, South Australia), Solar Hydrogen Economy, published in 1974 (a follow-up book published in 1980). He mentions a research project in New Mexico in the first book. In 1988 I drove on I-40 west toward Barstow, CA, and noticed a bright light ahead. I was curious and found out about an hour later, driving about 60 mph (double nickel speed limit was still in force), that it was a solar boiler surrounded by mirrors – just as described in Bockris’ book. A ‘Central Tower Receiver’ system. I noticed a sign, but don’t remember who owned/operated the facility. I drove through Barstow a number of years later and noticed some changes to the facility. I also noticed a new, larger solar generation facility on the west side of Barstow. Just to dispel the idea that there was nothing done regarding solar technology in the United States!
And ‘global warming’ is NOT fact, PURE fiction and an ENORMOUS HOAX with only one design: to rip us off big time! KFC in San Marino may want to start sending his money to algore and the UN. I’m sure they’ll be happy to take it. I keep mine. Short term ‘climate change’ is generally known as Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. Long term ‘climate fluctuation’ has been part of the earth’s life cycle since inception. “They shall reap what they sow” is somewhere in the Bible – the same book that describes how the world came about!
Its good to see someone taking a lead …ME countries are well placed considering the huge corpus of funds( read it oil surplus) they are sitting on. And as more and more investments are made, solar power could well achieve economies of scale and a viable alternative. It will be good to see them making these investments in their own countries considering the vast stretch of deserts..
the day you can put a panel on your roof and heat a tank of water . Using just those two unit`s in a simple fit system , that any D.I.Y could do . Is the day that we stop our reliance on fossil fuel`s . I believe it`s not too far away .
No one spends 1.2 billion dollars for a PR stunt. Clearly not willing to come to terms with the rest of the world’s enthusiasm for capitalism and their likelihood to succeed with US consumer $$, leaving us high and dry if we fail to perpetuate the principles we seeded.
Ha! Yeah right. No way they can get any grip on this market except in financial capital (notice this a Spanish company). The UAE has no talent, no skills. They have to import it all to do their oil work, construction, medicine, etc. When their oil is gone or irrelevant, so are they.
PR Stunt? Maybe….
Thanks
Jason Berkes
It is def. not a PR stunt, it’s a long term investment that will serve the needs of the future generations of UAE. Well done, hope the rest of the G.C.C states follow suite.
By the way nuclear energy is another alternative they (G.C.C) will start investing in the near future.
Whether they in-house develop them which will take too long, (like what Iran is doing right now) or acquiring it off the shelf which is faster and more expensive, (they surely got the capital and urge for it), so why not?
1. There are making good use of the revenue generated from America’s oil consumption.
2. They are insuring there own future once the oil runs out. Not only in the energy industry, but also tourism and financial.
U.A.E is a few steps ahead of some of those countries that only focus in the next financial quarter or presidential term.
Keep it up!