Seen from the sky, the Ivanpah Solar Power Facility in California’s Mojave Desert resembles a futuristic dream.

By Michael Kaplan

Viewed from the bottom line, however, Ivanpah is anything but. The New York Post has the story.

The solar power plant, which features three 459-foot towers and thousands of computer-controlled mirrors known as heliostats, cost some $2.2 billion to build.

Construction began in 2010 and was completed in 2014. Now it’s set to close in 2026 after failing to efficiently generate solar energy.

In 2011, the US Department of Energy under President Barack Obama issued $1.6 billion in three federal loan guarantees for the project and the secretary of energy, Ernest Moniz, hailed it as “an example of how America is becoming a world leader in solar energy.”

But ultimately, it’s been more emblematic of profligate government spending and unwise bets on poorly conceived, quickly outdated technologies.

“Ivanpah stands as a testament to the waste and inefficiency of government subsidized energy schemes,”Jason Isaac, CEO of the American Energy Institute, an American energy advocacy group, told Fox News via statement this past February. It “never lived up to its promises, producing less electricity than expected, while relying on natural gas to stay operational.”

When Ivanpah began operating in 2014, it ranked as the world’s largest solar plant. It seemed like a viable solution to California’s renewable energy goals of employing affordable and efficient technology to reduce the need for fossil fuels.

Located near the California-Nevada border, 65 miles southwest of Las Vegas, the plant’s glowing towers are as striking as some casinos on the Strip.

The facility’s 5 square miles of desert were covered with some 173,500 heliostats, adjusted via computer to catch maximum rays. The computer-controlled mirrors can reflect light from the sun at temperatures that can reach 1,000 degrees in part of the installment.

Read the full story here.