Towers of power

A California utility plans to power more than 800,000 homes with solar electricity in a new project.

Southern California Edison plans to puchase electricity from a series of solar towers to be operated by BrightSource Energy.

Drawing from the design of a BrightSource "power tower" in Israel’s Negev Desert, the California towers will use heliostats or moving mirrors to concentrate light onto a tower. This concentrated energy will be used to make steam. The first project will be completed in 2013, according to this article.

Aiming to generate 100-megawatts of power in Ivanpah, Calif., Brightsource says it can power 65,000 homes via 286,000 megawatt-hours of electricity per year.

Financial details of the deal are not being revealed, but some are calling this one of the biggest solar power contracts in the United States.

This is the kind of project that can be replicated in many areas of the United States.

Here's a video from Brightsource.