PARABOLIC TROUGH POWER FOR THE CALIFORNIA COMPETITIVE MARKET

California is about to complete its third year of a deregulated competitive wholesale power market. During the first two years of the competitive market, power prices averaged between 2 and 3¢/kWh. During 2000, electric supply to Ca lifornia was constrained a number of times causing maximum the price of power to peak over 100¢/kWh, and the average price of power to quadruple. The power output from solar plants tends to coincide with the high power demand periods in California. This fact had been demonstrated by the solar electric generating stations (SEGS) located in the California Mojave Desert, which operate under specific contracts signed in the 1980’s and early 1990’s with the local utility. This paper, on the other hand, examines how new parabolic trough solar plants would have faired on the wholesale competitive power market during 1999 and 2000.