BrightSource Energy Inc. said Monday it has completed financing
of the $2.1 billion Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the
desert of San Bernardino County, with federally guaranteed loans
and an equity investment from Google.
Leslie Berkman
BrightSource Energy Inc. said Monday it has completed financing of the $2.1 billion Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the desert of San Bernardino County, with federally guaranteed loans and an equity investment from Google.
In addition to obtaining $1.6 billion in loans guaranteed by the U.S. Department of Energy, Oakland-based BrightSource announced Google will invest $168 million in the project, which is under construction in the Mojave Desert just west of the Nevada border.
Google joins NRG Solar LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of NRG Energy, which in October said it would provide up to $300 million to become the lead investor in the project. Also BrightSource is making an investment of an “undisclosed amount,” said BrightSource spokesman Keely Wachs.
The 392-million megawatt project is scheduled for completion in 2012, when it is expected to generate enough electricity to power 140,000 homes. About two-thirds of the electricity produce will be sold to Pacific Gas & Electric and a third to Southern California Edison.
In a prepared statement, Rick Needham, director of green business operations at Google, embraced the pioneering nature of the Ivanpah project that he said “will be the largest solar power tower project in the world, able to produce clean energy at the highest efficiency of any solar thermal plant.”
The plant will be engineered so thousands of mirrors are positioned to reflect sunlight onto a boiler filled with water atop a tower. The heated water will create steam that then will be piped into a conventional turbine to generate electricity.
