IEC TS 62862-1-1:2018(E) contains the main terms and definitions used by the solar thermal electric (STE) industry and intends to be a reference for users of industry documents. Since the components and configurations of STE plants depend on the concentrating solar thermal technology used (i.e., central _receiver_, _parabolic-trough collector_, parabolic-dish or linear Fresnel _concentrator_), some terms are not applicable to all types of STE plants and notes have been introduced in their definitions for clarification.