Special Advertising Section

Mirrors focus the power of about 600 suns on a receiver at the top of the Solúcar tower.

Solar Energy in Spain is forging ahead with plans to build concentrating solar power plants, establishing the country and Spanish companies as world leaders in the emerging field. At the same time, the number of installed photovoltaic systems is growing exponentially, and researchers continue to explore new ways to promote and improve solar power. This is the seventh in an eight-part series highlighting new technologies in Spain and is produced by Technology Review, Inc.’s custom-publishing division in partnership with the Trade Commission of Spain.

From the road to the Solúcar solar plant outside Seville, drivers power. The tower outside Seville, built and operated by Solúcar, can see what appear to be glowing white rays emanating from an Abengoa company, is the first of a number of solar thermal a tower, piercing the dry air, and alighting upon the upturned plants and will provide about 10 megawatts of power. The com- faces of the tilted mirror panels below. Appearances, though, pany Sener is completing Andasol 1, the first parabolic-trough are deceiving: those upturned mirrors are actually tracking the plant in Europe—a 50-megawatt system outside that sun and radiating its energy onto a blindingly white square at will begin operation in the summer of 2008. the top of the tower, creating the equivalent of the power of 600 Unlike photovoltaic panels, which harness the movement of suns. That power is used to vaporize water into steam to power electrons between layers of a solar cell when the sun strikes the a turbine. material, solar thermal power works by utilizing the heat of the This tower plant uses concentrating solar technology with a sun. CSP has until recently cost nearly twice as much as tradi- central receiver. It’s the first commercial central-receiver sys- tional or power plants, and it is effective only tem in the world. on a large scale. “You need a very large budget to set up a con- Spanish companies and research centers are taking the lead centrated solar power system,” says Eduardo Zarza, director of in the recent revival of concentrating solar power (CSP), a concentrating solar research at the Solar Platform of Almería type of solar thermal power; expanses of mirrors are being (PSA in Spanish), a research, development, and testing center. assembled around the country. At the same time, Spanish “You need a great deal of land, a steam turbine, an electricity companies are investing in huge photovoltaic (PV) fields, as generator, power equipment, people in the control room, staff companies dramatically increase production of PV panels to run the system.” The costs are also front-loaded, unlike those and investigate the next generation of this technology. Spain of traditional plants: the fuel is free, unlike oil, gas, or coal, but is already fourth in the world in its use of solar power, and the up-front development expense is significantly higher. second in Europe, with more than 120 megawatts in about 8,300 During and immediately following the energy crisis of the installations. Within only the past 10 years, the number of 1970s, nine solar thermal plants were built in California to abengoa companies working in solar energy has leapt from a couple produce a total of 350 megawatts, but until this year no new of of dozen to a few hundred. commercial plant had been built, anywhere in the world, for 15 years.

courtesy Power from the Sun’s Heat PV costs run nearly double those of solar thermal for a power

Southern Spain, a region known the world over for its abundant plant of a similar size, but PV has the advantage of modularity;

photos sun and scarce rain, provides an ideal landscape for solar thermal panels can be incorporated into individual homes, companies,

www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar S1 Special Advertising Section

The Solúcar solar thermal power plant, which uses a central receiving tower, is the first such commercial plant in the world.

At this plant, we’re working with the potential of about 3,000 suns—so it “has to be very well designed and operated to provide the best results.”

and buildings or installed in small spaces. The heat transfer fluid then travels to well designed and operated to provide This micropower approach has helped the a steam generator, where the heat is trans- the best results.” market for PV explode in the past five ferred to water, immediately turning the Fernández says that so far the facility years, while solar thermal remained water into steam. That steam powers a is operating as intended, but improve- moribund. turbine, the same technology used in con- ments will be incorporated into future With gas costs rising and the world ventional power plants. towers. “This isn’t the best temperature sharpening its focus on global warming, The tower technology works on the for the highest efficiency,” he says, “but and governments around the world mak- same principle as the troughs—the sun’s we wanted to test the safety and security ing a concerted attempt to invest in alter- heat—but uses curved mirrors called of the design for this first installation. native energy sources on a larger scale, heliostats, mounted on trackers that shift We’ll do the remaining research neces- solar thermal is attracting new attention. position with a slight mechanical groan sary in order to use higher temperatures In Spain in particular, the technology every few seconds. The heliostats direct in future plants.” He explains that the has been assisted by Royal Decree 436, the sun’s light to a central receiver at the cooling system for the boiler is more implemented in March 2004, which top of the tower. Testing towers have complicated as temperatures increase, approved a feed-in tariff (a guaranteed been built in Spain, the United States, but that once those changes are imple- price) for solar thermal power. The feed- and Israel, but the Solúcar PS10 site is mented, the tower’s efficiency could in tariff made building this type of the first commercial application of the improve by 20 percent. power plant economically viable. The technology. The tower is also supported by a small government also recognizes that, as with At PS10, 624 heliostats, 120 square amount of natural gas, used when a wind, support is necessary at the begin- meters each (nearly 1,300 square feet), stretch of rainy or overcast weather pre- ning to enable the creation of new concentrate solar radiation at the top of a vents the plant’s full operation and the plants—which will most likely drive 115-meter tower (about 377 feet). A stored energy cannot stretch far enough down prices, as has happened in Spain receiver at the top transfers the heat to compensate. “It’s good to be able to with . directly to water, and the pressurized maintain stability, not be stopping and steam reaches 250 ºC. starting up the turbines more than once a Technologies The engineering behind such a plant day, as they’re designed to do,” says The most common technology so far, and takes into account both the need to heat Fernández. the one in use at Andasol 1, is based on a up the receiver and the importance of When completed in 2012, the entire

series of parabolic troughs, huge curved moderating the energy directed at it. “At Solúcar facility, called the Sanlúcar La mirrors about 18 feet wide that collect the this plant, we’re working with the poten- Mayor Solar Platform, will generate more abengoa sun’s energy and focus it on a receiver pipe tial of about 3,000 suns, but the absorp- than 300 megawatts of solar power, using of in the middle. Oil streams through that tion panels can only handle 600 suns,” tower and trough technologies along with pipe along a long loop of troughs. The says Valerio Fernández, head of engi- PV installations. Abengoa, owner of

courtesy mirrors slowly track the sun from east to neering and commissioning for Solúcar. Solúcar, has also recently signed plans to

west during daytime hours, and the oil “We have to control the aiming to pro- build combined-cycle power plants in

photos reaches about 400 ºC (about 750 ºF). tect the solar panels. So it has to be very Algeria and Morocco, using parabolic

S2 www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar Special Advertising Section

nese Institute of Technology purchased parabolic-trough systems across the Sener’s services to determine the best country. dimensions for a solar plant it wanted to develop. Advancing the Field Andasol is Sener’s first solar thermal Eduardo Zarza is having a great day. In site, though the company has already bro- fact, he’s having a great year. With a ken ground on another site nearby, and a barely suppressed grin, PSA’s director of third is being planned for a location in the concentrating solar research describes northern part of country. how the center has gone from a research The company has faced hurdles in outpost, where he and other researchers building this facility, the first major toiled away on solar thermal power for 25 parabolic-trough system in Spain. “There years, to an international superstar (at have been a lot of challenges,” says Nora least in certain circles), with near daily Castañeda, an engineer in charge of the visits from companies and scientists from site’s construction, laughing. “We can around the world. troughs in conjunction with natural-gas begin with the design itself. It was dif- Says Zarza, “Every week we have sev- power plants. ficult to find the right manufacturers, eral companies coming to see the facili- One of the main advantages of solar because there are so few suppliers of the ties to get information, because they’re thermal power, in addition to the cost parts. We had to learn how to assemble interested in investing in solar thermal benefit, is the potential for power storage. a solar field like this in a short time. plants. The situation has changed dra- The Solúcar tower uses a system of heat Once we solved one problem, another matically in only two years.” storage based on pressurized water. appeared.” The center, surrounded by dusty rose- ­Sener’s Andasol site will use a more But as quickly as problems have colored mountains dotted with green, lies advanced system taking advantage of the appeared, she says, the staff worked hard in a particularly dry area, with only 20 specific properties of molten salt. It’s to find solutions. They built an assembly percent of Andalusia’s average rainfall. been tested in Spain but has not yet been plant on-site and worked with Spanish Back in the 1970s, with Western coun- implemented commercially. construction companies to create appro- tries feeling the pressure of restricted Located about an hour outside priate jigs with laser trackers for the access to oil, a consortium of nine coun- Granada, home to the world-famous extremely precise task of building the tries—eight European nations and the Alhambra, Andasol 1 will provide power parabolic mirrors and transporting the United States—signed an agreement to well into the evening hours. Sener, which system to the field without disruption. investigate two solar technologies: one is constructing the plant with a company Castañeda says she expects the lessons based on parabolic troughs, the other on called Cobra, has built extra troughs that learned from Andasol 1 to help drive a central receiver (like Solúcar’s tower will direct heated oil to 28,000 tons of down the cost of future systems. receiver). molten salt (the salt is being imported Other companies are part of this rising In 1985, the test results were in: both from Chile). The salt must reach a high trend: the Spanish utility giant Iberdrola technologies were commercially feasible, enough temperature to liquefy—and recently announced plans for 10 but costs were too high. then it must be maintained in a liquid state to prevent it from causing block- ages. Tubes carrying heated oil will pass Growth of through the molten salt, raising the tem- 120 MW perature even higher, and the salt will retain the heat energy. As evening falls, 100 MW the thermal energy will be transferred back to the oil, which will continue on to

atts 80 MW the heat exchanger and power the steam aw

turbine. g 60 MW One of Sener’s innovations in this e m field was the development of new simula- 40 MW tion software, called Sensol, that takes into account all the variables that go into 20 MW building a solar plant, determining the source production costs and the appropriate 0 : : dimensions. This technology has also 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 AS I been used outside the country; the Japa- F www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar S3 Special Advertising Section

Since then, the center has continued “We’re very happy with the situation bottom of the glass tube, which could testing and refining the technology, now,” says Zarza. “In the past, few people cause it to break.” Heating oil, unlike working with universities and countries wanted to learn about our systems—now, water, remains in liquid form throughout around the world. Though there are other everybody wants to.” the process. Scientists have tinkered with research centers with departments dedi- Research has focused on technolo- tubes to develop one that can withstand cated to concentrating solar power, PSA gies to increase the efficiency and these temperature changes, and soon a is the largest such research center in the decrease the cost of these concentrating new three-megawatt facility will be built world. solar systems. Reflectors and absorber at PSA to test it. The center is one of two Spanish pipes have been refined, and the cou- Fernández of Abengoa’s Solúcar, one research facilities that operate as part of pling between the solar and conventional of the companies participating in the what’s known as Ciemat (the other, near systems has been improved. The use of research project, looks forward to replac- Madrid, focuses on wind and ). molten salt for heat storage was tested ing heating oil with water. “Oil is expen- Sixty percent of the budget comes from on-site before Sener went ahead with sive,” he says, “and in theory you can go the government, while the other 40 per- plans to install such a system in the new to higher temperatures with water and cent comes from grants and industry Andasol facility. Researchers also con- pressurized steam, because oil has a heat partnership. Lack of funds threatened the tinue partnering with European compa- limit. It’s also more efficient if you can do center’s operations several times, and it nies to develop alternative and even away with the heat exchanger.” nearly closed. more effective storage systems, which A significant challenge facing devel- A rapidly growing interest in renew- could greatly increase solar thermal’s opers of CSP plants remains cost—in ables, government incentives to promote viability in the marketplace. large part because these plants haven’t energy alternatives, and the rising cost of The center is currently investigating been built before. Parabolic mirrors must oil and gas placed PSA in the perfect replacing heating oil in absorber pipes be produced to exacting specifications, position to take a leading role in the devel- with water, so the steam turbine could be and tubes for the oil must be made of two opment of technolo- linked to the solar field directly, bypass- glass layers with a vacuum between them. gies. After decades in the literal and ing a heat exchanger. “Conceptually, this There’s currently one mirror manufac- figurative desert, Zarza finds himself at seems so simple,” says Zarza, “but that’s turer in Europe and two manufacturers of the center of a renaissance: the technol- not actually the case. Water boils and the glass tubes, one in Israel and another ogy is finally, once again, entering the then turns to steam, and during the transi- in Germany. “So when there are more marketplace—and the center’s activities tion phase there could be very high tem- manufacturers producing those tubes, appear secure and are flourishing. perature differences between the top and and when there’s a larger production in general, you’re going to get more compe- tition and a scale advantage,” says Peter Duprey, director of Acciona Energy North America, a subsidiary of a Spanish company. He adds, “I think this is at a fairly early stage in its evolution, and with more money and more people focusing on this energy alternative, I think you’re going to drive costs down, just like what happened with wind. In the 1980s it was 30 cents per kilowatt-hour; now it’s down to about 7 cents. I think you’ll see the same thing with concentrating solar.” Both Abengoa and Sener are working with other Spanish companies to jump- start the production of parabolic mirrors and glass tubes in Spain, to increase pro-

duction, competition, and local access to ona i the necessary parts. At least two local acc companies will begin producing mirrors of within the year, and another few are investigating developing new absorber courtesy

pipes. Spanish companies continue to innovate in the technology and “Electricity costs are going up—and marketing of photovoltaic power. photos solar thermal costs are going down,” says

S4 www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar Special Advertising Section

Parabolic troughs capture the sun’s energy to heat synthetic oil at Acciona’s Nevada Solar One. That heat will turn water into steam to power a turbine.

Zarza. “We think they will meet some- Electricity costs are going up—and solar thermal where in the middle.” “costs are going down. We think they will meet some- In the U.S. where in the middle.” The first solar thermal power plants in the world, nine in total, were built in Kramer connection points. That can be devel- researcher Antonio Luque was sent to Junction, in dry, sunny southern Califor- oped, and I think we can get gigawatts the United States to share information nia, in the 1980s. They still harness 350 worth of concentrating solar power over about microelectronics. He became megawatts of solar heat. Since the last of the next 10 years.” inspired by American work on PV and those plants was built, however, the tech- Nevada requires its utilities to gener- returned to Spain, founded the Institute nology halted in the United States, as it ate a percentage of their electricity from for Solar Research (IES in Spanish) in did in the rest of the world. Research con- renewable sources. The wind is weak in 1975, and eventually spun off the com- tinued at American research centers such southern Nevada, but the sun burns hot, pany Isofotón in 1981. By 1982 the com- as the National Renewable Energy Lab and the state provided an investment tax pany was already marketing the first (NREL). credit—so Acciona took on the project. Spanish solar cells. This summer, the first new plant, built This type of technology demands vast Luque’s first contribution to the solar by Acciona with technology from the amounts of land for the parabolic troughs, field was the development of bifacial U.S. company Solargenix, came on-line and the plant is most efficient if it can be cells, which take advantage of sunlight outside Las Vegas in the abundantly sited close to the demand. Conditions in from both sides. These cells provided sunny Nevada desert. the western United States, particularly Isofotón’s start, but higher development The Spanish company acquired 55 the Southwest, meet both those require- and maintenance costs prevented their percent of Solargenix early in 2006 and ments. The Western Governors’ Associa- early adoption, and Isofotón reverted to then began plans to build Nevada Solar tion has stated its commitment to conventional solar cells. One, as the plant is known. The parabolic increasing the use of solar thermal power Today, the 60 researchers at IES—

troughs supply 64 megawatts, enough to in the region. one of the oldest solar centers in the photos power about 14,000 homes annually. world—continue to push ahead with

Acciona is also in the permitting stage for Photovoltaics advances in PV technology. The insti- courtesy two 50-megawatt CSP plants in Spain. The growth of solar in Spain is hardly lim- tute’s research areas include multijunc- Duprey, director of Acciona Energy ited to thermal power. Photovoltaic tech- tion cells that utilize a wider bandwidth

of

North America, says, “In the southwest nology is still the primary source of solar of solar energy; intermediate-band cells acc i

of the U.S. we have plenty of land that power; it has been central to the solar- that can capture lower-energy photons; ona effectively is unused, and is near grid power repertoire since the 1970s, when and concentrator systems in which lenses www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar S5 Special Advertising Section

multiply the sun’s energy up to 1,000 which has been in Spain for more than 20 Outside the building, a panel of times by focusing its light on tiny cells. years and is now planning a major produc- concentrating PV cells is mounted on The last technology is being developed tion expansion. In addition, the Spanish a tracker. Unlike standard photovolta- in partnership with Isofotón. company Atersa builds solar panels and ics, which can accept all ambient light, To further develop this new technol- provides full solar-power installations. At concentrating PV cells are most efficient ogy, the Institute for Photovoltaic Sys- its new Valencia factory, the company has when tracking the sun to appropriately tems of Concentration is being built in grown to 14 megawatts of annual capacity focus the light through the lenses. Thus, Puertollano, south of Madrid. Companies and will soon expand to 30 megawatts. as with solar thermal, the technology from Spain, including IES partner Another young solar panel company expe- will probably be most effective on a Most of the energy increase in the world will be in electricity, and most “of that will be in developing countries.” ­Guascor Fotón, will have demonstration riencing rapid growth is Siliken, which is large scale, so that fields of trackers can sites, along with companies from the developing a silicon plant to ensure a be set up to take advantage of the sun’s United States, Germany, and other coun- steady supply of raw materials. angled rays. tries. The goal is to improve the technol- Traditionally, Spanish companies The material used in concentrating ogy’s efficiency and decrease its cost in have exported about 80 percent of the photovoltaics is gallium arsenide, which an effort to speed commercialization. cells they produced, but with renewed is 50 times as expensive as silicon. But the Luque thinks solar cells will become interest in PV within Spain, those num- cells demand just one-thousandth as much cheaper, but he acknowledges that bers are changing. In only the last two much material, cutting costs. a precipitous drop in price will require years, nearly 100 megawatts of PV power When it comes to traditional PV pan- technological breakthroughs. He believes have been added. Isofotón expects to sell els, most companies focus on marketing these breakthroughs might be occurring about 60 percent of its panels within to the developed world—where money is already and that the technological Spain, though the company still exports available for PV and the process is as advances in store for PV will allow it to to Europe, North and South America, simple as creating the product and selling easily overtake solar thermal, even on a and Asia. it. But Isofotón has taken the lead in mar- power-plant scale. Jesús Alonso, Isofotón’s director of keting solar power to the developing In a huge, airy, light-filled building research and development, says what dis- world. This year the company expects near Málaga on Spain’s southern coast, tinguishes the company is the high qual- rural electrification to account for nearly Luque’s spinoff company, Isofotón, hums ity of its cells. “You can find information a quarter of its market. Even the market- with the excitement of the exploding PV in books about how to make solar cells,” ing works differently for this segment of scene. This factory was completed in he says. “The main difficulty is the know- the business: projects must be researched 2006, and ground has already been bro- how—it’s how to make sure that those and appropriate financial models devel- ken next door for an expansion. 400 wafers you put in the furnace are oped for each. Isofotón has rural electri- The company’s production and sales actually good, quality solar cells. That’s fication projects around South America, have shot up in the past few years, despite the key.” Morocco, Algeria, Indonesia, and South rough patches since its inception in 1981. Like all solar-cell producers, Isofotón Africa. Isofotón nearly went bankrupt twice as has been limited lately by the dearth of Solar power in these poor, rural solar power languished worldwide. But highly purified silicon necessary both regions is not used simply for home elec- in the late 1990s, Germany decided to for microelectronics and the solar indus- tricity but also for applications such as invest heavily in solar power. Isofotón try. In response, it has begun setting up water pumps and desalination. To main- was able to take advantage of the situa- silicon refining operations in Cadiz, tain a lead in this area, Isofotón is not tion, supplying 15 percent of the German which should begin production in just relying on the decades of experience market. It grew to become the seventh- 2008. it has already built up; it’s putting addi- largest producer of solar cells in the Working with Antonio Luque’s IES, tional research into how best to couple world—but the global market has grown Isofotón has focused its research on solar power with those types of applica- rapidly, and a handful of new companies developing concentrating PV cells. tions, since much of the existing equip- have jumped in to fill the need. Isofotón’s Downstairs in the factory, in a small room ment isn’t appropriately built to work rank has now dropped slightly even as its on the main factory floor, a machine with an intermittent energy source. business has expanded dramatically. whirs as thin sheets of one-millimeter “If we look to the really long term, I Spain has been one of the top world solar cells pass through a machine. The think that our main market will be rural producers of solar cells for the past tiny cells will be attached to gold wires electrification, because at the end these decade; the two main companies produc- and then serve as the focus of the concen- are the people who don’t have electricity,” ing those cells are Isofotón and BP Solar, trating lenses. says research director Alonso. “Most of

S6 www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar Special Advertising Section

Top and bottom left: Isofotón’s offices utilize solar power, with PV panels on the building’s exterior and solar skylights. Right: Isofotón’s robots create solar units. the energy increase in the world will be in electricity, and most of that will be in developing countries.” photos Acciona Solar, the solar-energy arm of Acciona Energía, has seen phenomenal growth rates, as have the other major courtesy companies involved in this field. The company’s income

exploded from about half a million euros to more than 96 of

i million euros in only eight years. sofotón Last December, the company connected the Monte Alto Solar Field to the grid; it’s the largest installation of its kind www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar S7 Special Advertising Section

in Spain, and one of the largest in the pared with those of a typical building. world. It consists of a field of standard PV The remaining energy is produced with Resources panels on trackers (which leads to 30 per- PV cells, solar water heating, and a small cent greater efficiency), spread out over amount of biodiesel. The investments will ICEX (Spanish Institute for a long-disused agricultural field in the pay off in 10 years, according to Arrarás. Foreign Trade) southern part of the state of Navarra, Thanks to the company’s experience, www.us.spainbusiness.com about an hour south of Pamplona. Acciona Solar is also researching ways Acciona Energía This is the latest of these fields, to improve and promote these high- www.acciona-energia.com known as “huertas,” or gardens, in Span- ­performance buildings. ish. The 9.5-megawatt facility at Milagro Acciona is poised to begin construc- Atersa actually has more than 750 owners— tion on a PV solar field in Portugal that www.atersa.com investors from across Spain, each of will produce nearly 50 megawatts—five whom owns one or two of the panels and times as much as Milagro. Institute for Solar Energy trackers and receives payments from the www.ies.upm.es electric utility. Looking ahead Most live in apartment The Spanish government continues to pro- Isofotón buildings and share rooftops, so the mote investment in and expansion of both www.isofoton.es options for investing in solar power are photovoltaic and solar thermal power, SENER limited. “This way they can have the with a goal of 400 megawatts of installed www.sener.es same opportunities as the rest of the power for PV and 500 megawatts for solar world even if they don’t have their own thermal by 2010. This still represents only Siliken roof,” says Miguel Arrarás, director of a fraction of the country’s total power use www.siliken.com Acciona Solar. There are 10 such fields and total renewable production. in Spain, of which Milagro is the largest The government, however, is commit- Solar Platform of Almería so far, and three more about to enter the ted to advancing the sector. The new www.psa.es construction phase. building code of 2006 requires increased The region of Navarra, with local gov- energy efficiency and includes an obliga- Solúcar ernment support, has become a veritable tion to meet a significant part of the hot- www.solucar.es center of renewable energy, with wind water demand with passive solar heating. Spanish Photovoltaic turbines arching over the rolling hills and And the Renewable Energy Plan sets a Industry Association solar fields stretching across open spaces. lofty goal of 5 million square feet of solar www.asif.org The region’s PV capacity in watt peak per collectors by 2010. A royal decree inhabitant is more than 20 times that of approved in May 2007 improves the feed- To find out more about New Spain as a whole, and nearly double that in tariffs for both solar thermal and PV Technologies in Spain, visit: of Germany, the world solar leader. Sev- facilities. Some experts believe that these www.technologyreview.com/ enty percent of Navarra’s electricity is developments could lead Spain to become spain/solar generated from wind and solar alone. the world’s second-largest PV market in Because of this, Navarra has become 2007. Spanish companies and research For more information visit: a perfect site to evaluate the entire sys- institutions plan to remain at the forefront www.us.spainbusiness.com tem. “We’re testing 30 different kinds of the growing global field. Contact: of panels,” says Arrarás. “We also have Says Javier Anta, president of the Mr. Enrique Alejo data on the effects of shadows, fog, Spanish Photovoltaic Industry Associa- Trade Commission of Spain everything. We have an agreement tion, “The solar industry will be a major in Chicago with two universities just to analyze this part of the government’s goal of 20 500 N. Michigan Ave., Suite 1500 data.” He continues, “This is also the percent renewable energy by 2020. Chicago, IL 60611, USA perfect place to evaluate what the effect Despite the fact that solar is only a small T: 312 644 1154 is on the entire grid when, say, there are percentage of renewable power, it’s F: 312 527 5531 clouds, because of the high concentra- grown more than 100 percent a year in [email protected] tion of solar power here.” the past few years.” In fact, the sector The company’s operations are housed grew 200 percent in 2006. He continues, in a zero-emissions building on the out- “We’re facing a grand challenge: con- skirts of Pamplona. The building’s design solidating that which we’ve achieved so incorporates techniques, such as natural far, setting the framework for future light and carefully placed shading, that development, and creating a sector that reduce energy needs by 52 percent com- makes our country proud.”

S8 www.technologyreview.com/spain/solar