Solar thermal technologies are the future of alternative utility scale energy 
Vinod Khosla, Founder of Khosla Ventures, hailed solar thermal technologies as the future of alternative utility scale energy during a keynote talk at the SNS Future in Review (FiRe) 2008 technology conference.
Khosla cited the availability of solar, its low startup costs, scalability, and high productivity as factors behind the industry’s imminent success, while simultaneously respecting the rapidly growing distributed generation market of PV, which he clarifies as being a different market. Solar thermal is utility-scale, while PV is a rapidly growing distributed generation market.
One particularly attractive feature of solar thermal technology is the relatively small landmass needed for its implementation. “That’s all the area that would be needed to supply all the electric power in the U.S. -- one small 100-mile x 100-mile area in Nevada,” Khosla said, pointing to a map of the U.S. featuring a small square in the Southwest corner.
Vinod Khosla was a Co-Founder of Daisy Systems, Founding CEO of Sun Microsystems, and Partner at Kleiner Perkins before starting Khosla Ventures. “Vinod Khosla brings a great combination of original thinking and research, and straightforward vision, to this complex energy issue. Enhanced solar will be the ultimate answer to global requirements,” says Mark Anderson, Chair of FiRe and CEO of parent company Strategic News Service.
Related categories: Eco-friendly Power generation Solar power and photovoltaics
