24-Hour Solar Energy: Molten Salt Makes It Possible
These types of systems are generally not competitive with PV for electricity, since they require a lot of concentrated solar energy thus limiting the options for deployment. However, they are great for generating heat. And with heat you can trivially desalinate water. Since trees can be a nice carbon sink, I've often wondered if this type of scheme might make sense:<p>- Plant heliostat molten salt reactors in desert coastal areas (the concentrated solar kind)<p>- Use generated heat to desalinate water (e.g. Multi-stage flash distillation)<p>- Use desalinated water to provide irrigation<p>- Plant (potentially GMO'ed) trees and other bootstrapping organisms to "green" the desert<p>- Rinse repeat.<p>The net effect is that you can potentially turn large swaths of desert into forests, with minimal external energy requirements (and potentially build an agricultural community around them, more or less self contained in terms of water/energy)