--- title: This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night description: Could it replace conventional energy sources? canonical: https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/ author: Justin Worland article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-21T14:00:18.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:44:03.682Z article:section: Science og:title: This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night og:description: Could it replace conventional energy sources? og:url: https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2768ac0f29a82f96/6988902ba988ca39966b7887/crescent-dunes-1200-630.jpg?branch=production&width=1120&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1120 og:image:height: 630 og:image:alt: crescent-dunes-1200-630 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night twitter:description: Could it replace conventional energy sources? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2768ac0f29a82f96/6988902ba988ca39966b7887/crescent-dunes-1200-630.jpg?branch=production&width=1120&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: September 2026. ## TIME Newsletters: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition TIME publishes seven free email newsletters, written and edited by TIME journalists, reaching more than 1.1 million engaged readers. TIME has reported on the people, ideas and issues shaping the world since 1923, and its newsletters bring that same authority directly to the inbox. 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Brief (Washington politics, twice weekly), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=b35ef4b9-c08a-443d-a513-7a7ea44b337c&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/) and [Josh Raab](https://time.com/author/josh-raab/) Apr 21, 2016 2:00 PM UTC  ©2015 Jamey Stillings, All Rights Reserved by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/) and [Josh Raab](https://time.com/author/josh-raab/) Apr 21, 2016 2:00 PM UTC Crescent Dunes looks and sounds a bit like an invention lifted from a science fiction novel. Deep in the Nevada desert more than 10,000 mirrors—each the size of a highway billboard—neatly encircle a giant 640-foot tower. It looks like it might be used to communicate with aliens in deep space. But the engineers and financiers behind the facility, located in the desert about halfway between Las Vegas and Reno, say the power plant’s promise is anything but fiction. The solar power facility built and operated by the company SolarReserve can power 75,000 homes. What sets it apart from other big solar projects is that this plant can store power for use when it is most needed, including cloudy days and after dark—a major advance for renewable energy technology.  Jamey Stillings “This is the first utility-scale facility in the world with this technology,” says SolarReserve CEO Kevin Smith. “Our technology can truly replace conventional generation.” Most solar power plants, which use photovoltaic technology, capture energy through the solar panels themselves, converting the sun’s light straight to electricity and then routing it onto the grid for immediate use. That’s great when the sun is shining, but a few clouds can render the plants useless. And if it’s sunny when the power isn’t needed, the electricity will be wasted. The Crescent Dunes plant, and others in the class known as concentrated solar, does not have that problem. The plant uses thousands of mirrors to reflect light into a central tower. Inside, concentrated sunlight heats up liquid salt to over 1,050°F (566°C). Salt is capable of retaining very high levels of heat, turning it into a kind of thermal battery. When the utility company needs electricity on the grid, plant operators use the stored heat in the molten salt to power a traditional steam turbine. Altogether the process emits a whopping total of zero tons of carbon.  Jamey Stillings Crescent Dunes is one of three concentrated solar plants developed by Solar Reserve and it is the first full-scale plant built in the U.S. But the technology has the potential to expand rapidly in the coming years as regulators continue a push for clean energy. States like California and [New York](https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-cuomo-joined-vice-president-gore-announces-new-actions-reduce-greenhouse-gas-emissions) have both committed to getting 50% of their power from renewable sources in the coming decades—a change that would be difficult to accomplish without some form of clean energy storage. Just how much the concentrated solar market will grow in the coming years will depend primarily on the cost of deploying the technology. The method of collecting and storing energy is relatively new and expensive, but widespread deployment could reduce the costs to make it competitive, says Professor Jay Apt of the Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center. “We’re all hoping that, just like photovoltaic power, we’ll start getting on the downward slope of the learning curve,” says Apt. “If you crank a whole lot of those units, you’ll learn to do it better.”  Jamey Stillings Even with significant cost reductions, concentrated solar will need to face off against advances in battery technology that could make it easier to store power in electrical form—increasing the desirability of other renewable energy sources like photovoltaic and wind power. But Smith says his company’s technology has advantages over the competing methods right now. “People are spending a lot of money on the battery market,” he says. “But \[Crescent Dunes\] is more storage than all the utility-scale batteries in the world combined.”  More than 10,000 billboard-size mirrors encircle a central tower at the facility Jamey Stillings  The plant sits on a 1,600 acre site leased from the Bureau of Land Management Jamey Stillings  The central tower contains pipes with running molten salt that is heated to more than 1050°F (566°C). Jamey Stillings  The facility is the first large-scale concentrated solar plant in the U.S. Jamey Stillings  The facility uses storage technology to run at night—even though the sun isn't shining Jamey Stillings  The central tower contains 600,000 pounds of molten salt Jamey Stillings  The field of mirrors measures 1.7 miles in diameter Jamey Stillings  The facility is located in the desert between Reno and Las Vegas Jamey Stillings  Each mirror is about the size of a billboard Jamey Stillings  The facility required a total of 1.2 million square meters of glass—all sourced from the U.S. Jamey Stillings  The plant can power 75,000 homes Jamey Stillings ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/"},"headline":"This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night","datePublished":"2016-04-21T14:00:18.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:44:03.682Z","description":"Could it replace conventional energy sources?","url":"https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/","keywords":["energy","Tech","photography","solar energy","genius","american genius"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2768ac0f29a82f96/6988902ba988ca39966b7887/crescent-dunes-1200-630.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Justin Worland","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/justin-worland/"},{"@type":"Person","name":"Josh Raab","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/josh-raab/"}],"articleSection":"Science","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2768ac0f29a82f96/6988902ba988ca39966b7887/crescent-dunes-1200-630.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"crescent-dunes-1200-630","caption":"","creditText":"©2015 Jamey Stillings, All Rights Reserved","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/science/","name":"Science"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/energy/","name":"energy"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4291347/crescent-dunes-solar-power-plant/","name":"This Solar Power Plant Can Run All Night"}}]}] ```