section_path: Human relations/Solar energy capture
section_name: Solar energy capture
paragraph_text: Solar energy capture
  
  Deserts are increasingly seen as sources for solar energy, partly due to low amounts of cloud cover. Many solar power plants have been built in the Mojave Desert such as the Solar Energy Generating Systems and Ivanpah Solar Power Facility. Large swaths of this desert are covered in mirrors.
  
  The potential for generating solar energy from the Sahara Desert is huge, the highest found on the globe. Professor David Faiman of Ben-Gurion University has stated that the technology now exists to supply all of the world's electricity needs from 10% of the Sahara Desert. Desertec Industrial Initiative was a consortium seeking $560 billion to invest in North African solar and wind installations over the next forty years to supply electricity to Europe via cable lines running under the Mediterranean Sea. European interest in the Sahara Desert stems from its two aspects: the almost continual daytime sunshine and plenty of unused land. The Sahara receives more sunshine per acre than any part of Europe. The Sahara Desert also has the empty space totalling hundreds of square miles required to house fields of mirrors for solar plants.
  
  The Negev Desert, Israel, and the surrounding area, including the Arava Valley, receive plenty of sunshine and are generally not arable. This has resulted in the construction of many solar plants. David Faiman has proposed that "giant" solar plants in the Negev could supply all of Israel's needs for electricity.