Hybrid Stirling Power System for SKA passes the final test

on 04-05-2017

The final meeting of the Biostirling4SKA project was held on the past April 27th at Herdade da Contenda in Moura, Portugal. IT, together with other academic and industry partners, as well as important personalities from renewables, all joined the meeting where the results of the final demo of the hybrid stirling power system for SKA receivers were presented. SKA (Square Kilometer Array) will be the world´s largest telescope and the first mega-science production to be energy self-sufficient, with an expected direct economic and indirect societal impacts in the developing nations where it will be installed.

The basic features that identify this hybrid stirling technology are its flexibility, scalability and simplicity for installation on any terrain, being possible the hybridized use with gas or biomass. The objective of the B4SKA Plant is to demonstrate the generation of clean electric power using simultaneously solar power and biomass energy in the form of biogas, and serve as a scalable example of power supply for future developments of applications to larger scientific infrastructures like the Square Kilometre Array - SKA. Tests proved that the hybrid mode concept is working. SKA will be built in high solar irradiated zones (South Africa with distant stations in Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Australia/New Zealand).