Dr. Wagner was recently a guest on the Illuminating Science podcast, where he and host John Binkley talked in depth about concentrating solar power and the work ongoing at the ESOLab. The full episode is also available on the ESOLab Resources page.
Episode description:
Dr. Mike Wagner is an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Wisconsin Madison. His work focuses on the optimization of renewable energy production, in particular from concentrating solar plants, in order to maximize efficiency and profitability of those systems. We talk about how concentrating solar plants work and what advantages they offer when compared to other renewables like wind or photovoltaics. We also discuss grid frequency and stability and how the increasing presence of variable renewable power sources is creating challenges in terms of maintaining grid frequency and stability.