When most people think solar power, they envision a photovoltaic (PV) system. This is largely because PV systems have generally been a consumer grade product used in wrist watches and portable calculators. More recently PV systems have been expanded to include tops of homes and power for remote cellular towers. The challenge in bringing PV to the mainstream market is that these systems are fairly expensive and have poor efficiencies.
On the opposite end of the spectrum is concentrated solar power (CSP). Generally desert installations of metal and glass, these systems are very big, often times cover hundreds if not thousands of acres. CSP has had great success for decades producing power in very large blocks, an example of which is California’s Kramer Junction, producing 354 megawatts of power.
