AORA Tulip Hybrid Solar Power System
On the quest to become carbon neutral by 2025, Ethiopia has enlisted the aid of Israeli solar company AORA Solar to deploy giant solar collecting tulips to help them reach their cleantech goals. While pilot Tulips have been tested in Israel, Spain and the US, Ethiopia will mark AORA Solars first commercial deployment of their novel clean energy system.
What is a Tulip
Named after their likeness to the popular garden flower, an AORA Tulip is a hybrid solar power system that combines the technologies of concentrated solar and biogas into a modular package that can provide energy to off-grid rural locations. The hybrid system allows the Tulip to continue providing electricity after the sun has set or in overcast weather conditions. A single can produce 100 kW of electricity and 170 kW of heat. Couple that with the fact that it only occupies 3,500 square meters, and you have an efficient energy system with a relatively high kWh per land than competing solar power systems. A single Tulip can power 30-40 homes in the West which is more than enough energy required to cover the needs of villages in the developing world.
How does the Tulip Work?
Past attempts to provide solar power to rural communities or villages in developing countries have been thwarted by the inherent intermittency of solar energy. These systems would cease providing power once the sun went down, during overcast skies, or the rainy season. As a result, luxuries often taken for granted in the Western world, like refrigeration or nocturnal lighting remained unavailable to these rural off-grid communities. The Tulip tackles this problem by taking a concentrated solar system and backing it up with biogas to continue providing power when the sun is unavailable.
Concentrated Solar Tower
On the solar powered side of the equation, is a single tower, the Tulip surrounded by a field of mirrors designed to track the sun. The suns rays are concentrated onto the bulb of the Tulip heating the compressed air within to extremely high temperatures. Steam generated from water within the bulb turns a turbine providing power. Since water is often scarce in these rural communities, the Tulip is extremely water efficient, only requiring 8% of the water normally consumed by comparable concentrated solar power (CSP) steam technologies.
Biogas and Alternative Fuels
When sun isnt available, the Tulip can use a biogas digester/storage tank to convert organic feedstock from crops or animal manure into biogas, which can be burned as fuel to turn the turbine and provide utility grade power generation. This means the Tulip synergizes well with rural farms and can help developing villages manage their waste. The Tulip can also accept alternative fuels to run as a conventional power generator, and can seamlessly transition between the two technologies.
Cold Storage Facility
Depending on the plant module, some installations also come equipped with a cold storage facility for food refrigeration that utilizes 170kw of waste heat from the tower to operate its absorption chiller. The Tulip was developed at the Weizmann Institute, where Zev Rosenzweig, CEO of AORA and one of the lead researchers at the school came up with the idea after seeing how people in rural communities would lose much of their harvest due to the inability to refrigerate fruits and vegetables.
Tulips Educating the Future
In addition to the power plants, AORA is also installing Tulips two universities in Ethiopia to help advance education in renewable technologies in the country. They will serve local communities and give students the experience and knowledge they need to actively participate in the future of green technologies.