Concentrating Solar Power Resource Maps

These direct-normal solar radiation maps—filtered by solar resource and land availability—identify the most economically suitable lands available for deploying of large-scale concentrating solar power plants in the southwestern United States.

Each of the following seven states, as well as the southwestern U.S. region, has two maps: the left and right maps represent analyses excluding land with slopes >1% and >3%, respectively. Lower-resolution jpg versions are available below; much higher-resolution pdf files, suitable for plotting large-scale posters, can be requested. You can also access an unfiltered direct-normal solar radiation map of the southwestern United States (PDF 2.2 MB).

Southwestern U.S.
Arizona
California
Colorado
New Mexico
Nevada
Texas
Utah

The index for each map includes three categories of information: power plants by generation type; transmission lines in a range of kilovolts (kV); and direct-normal solar radiation in kilowatt-hours per square meter per day (kWh/m²/d).

NREL has developed these maps to support the Southwest Concentrating Solar Power 1000-MW Initiative. Our Geographic Information Systems (GIS) team assisted with the development of these maps, as well as with the Solar Power Prospector Tool, an interactive mapping tool.

Visit TroughNet for more information about parabolic trough power plant market and economic assessment.