High Ground

While West Texas residents spend considerable effort combating Old Sol’s sometimes-withering effects, the daystar promises to become a significant source of cooling and other energy needs if proposed alternative-energy projects come to fruition.

“West Texas is one of the finest places in the nation for generation of electricity from solar,” says Doug Washington of WorldWater & Power Corp. His New Jersey-based company builds solar power systems coast-to-coast, ranging from irrigation and water-utility pumps to industrial refrigeration applications.

Currently, the company is soliciting partners for super-size solar-generating stations in The High Ground, proposing as many as 500 acres of photovoltaic panels that would generate electricity cleanly and silently. “We are trying to work with communities that are interested in generating their own clean, renewable solar electricity,” Washington says. “We’re also looking at situations where they’re interested in combining solar and wind generation.”

Meanwhile, EnviroMission, an Australian company, has devised a megaproject proposal and is prospecting in West Texas for a utility to take it on. The project, which is in feasibility studies in Australia, would have a footprint of 3,000 to 4,000 acres.

According to Chris Davey, EnviroMission’s business development manager, the land would be covered by a translucent material, with a 2,600-foot-tall thermal tower standing in the center. The solar-heated air would rise and be drawn into the tower, where it would be harnessed to drive electricity-generating turbines.

Morse Haynes, director of the Monahans Economic Development Corp., is one of the people scouting for the massive site such a project would require. “There would be enough electricity generated to power about 400,000 homes,” Haynes says, “and this represents annual savings of close to 2 million tons of greenhouse gases from entering the environment. That is the equivalent of taking 500,000 cars off the road annually.”