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Concentrating Solar Power Tower Technology: Present Status and Outlook

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Concentrating Solar Power Tower Technology: Present Status and Outlook Nonlinear Engineering 2019; 8: 10–31 Albert Boretti*, Stefania Castelletto, and Sarim Al-Zubaidy Concentrating solar power tower technology: present status and outlook https://doi.org/10.1515/nleng-2017-0171 Received December 19, 2017; accepted February 21, 2018. 1 Introduction Abstract: The paper examines design and operating data The basic principles of concentrated solar power (CSP) sys- of current concentrated solar power (CSP) solar tower (ST) tems are covered in previous reference works such as [1– plants. The study includes CSP with or without boost by 5]. Lenses or mirrors concentrate the sun light energy on a combustion of natural gas (NG), and with or without ther- small area. The concentrated radiant energy is then con- mal energy storage (TES). Latest, actual specic costs per verted to heat at high temperature. The heat is nally installed capacity are high, 6,085 $/kW for Ivanpah So- transferred to a power cycle working uid (typically wa- lar Electric Generating System (ISEGS) with no TES, and ter/steam). Superheated steam typically drives a Rankine 9,227 $/kW for Crescent Dunes with TES. Actual produc- steam turbine cycle. Concentrators dier in the way they tion of electricity is low and less than the expected. Actual track the sun and focus the light. The most popular con- capacity factors are 22% for ISEGS, despite combustion of centrating technologies are Parabolic Trough (PT) and So- a signicant amount of NG exceeding the planned values, lar Tower (ST). Dierent concentrators provide dierent re- and 13% for Crescent Dunes. The design values were 33% ceiver temperature and peak temperature of the steam for and 52%. The study then reviews the proposed technol- the power cycle, with correspondingly varying thermal ef- ogy updates to improve ratio of solar eld power to elec- ciency of the power cycle. In addition to the type of re- tric power, capacity factor, matching of production and ceiver and the solar eld feeding this receiver, also the re- demand, plant’s cost, reliability and life span of plant’s ceiver uid (RF) plays a role in the peak temperatures of components. Key areas of progress are found in materi- the steam. Current RFs include oil, molten salt (MS) or wa- als and manufacturing processes, design of solar eld and ter/steam. Intermediate heat exchangers are needed be- receiver, receiver and power block uids, power cycle pa- tween oil or MS and water/steam. MS permits thermal en- rameters, optimal management of daily and seasonal op- ergy storage (TES) in hot and cold reservoir to decouple eration of the plant, new TES concepts, integration of solar electricity production from availability of sun light. While plant with thermal desalination or combined cycle gas tur- an additional MS circuit has been proposed as an ap- bine (CCGT) installations and specialization of project. pendage to existing CSP plants with oil as RF, MS provides better outcome when used directly as the RF. Replacement Keywords: renewable energy; concentrated solar power; of oil with MS permits operation at higher temperatures for solar tower; parabolic trough; natural gas boost; thermal higher steam temperature and higher eciency of power energy storage; molten salt; steam; Rankine cycles generation. Additionally, it lowers the cost of TES. Direct use of water/steam as a RF has the advantage of simplic- ity, cost and sometimes eciency. However, this links the production of electricity to sun availability. Condensation of steam usually occurs in air-cooled towers. Water cooled condensers may permit better power cycle eciencies but are impractical in mostly desert locations. By using the combustion of natural gas (NG), it is pos- *Corresponding Author: Albert Boretti, Department of Mechan- sible to drastically improve the match between production ical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE), Benjamin M. Statler and demand of CSP plants. However, boost by NG is rea- College of Engineering and Mineral Resources, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV 26506, United States, E-mail: al- sonable only if performed in minimal extent, for both ef- [email protected], [email protected] ciency of energy use and regulations concerning emis- Stefania Castelletto, School of Engineering, RMIT University, Bun- sions of carbon dioxide. The use of NG in a combined cycle doora, VIC 3083, Australia, E-mail: [email protected] gas turbine (CCGT) plant occurs with a fuel conversion e- Sarim Al-Zubaidy, The University of Trinidad and Tobago, Trinidad ciency that is about double the eciency of a CSP plant op- and Tobago, E-mail: [email protected] Open Access. © 2019 A. Boretti et al., published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution alone 4.0 License. Albert Boretti et al., Concentrating solar power tower technology: present status and outlook Ë 11 erated with NG only (η above 60% vs. η around 30%). The while the total solar contribution to the global energy mix spreading in between the η of a CSP plant and a NG fueled is still minimal [6, 7, 9–11]. According to [7], in 2016 glob- plant is similarly large in cases of cogeneration, where the ally only wind and solar PV power systems have seen a gas turbine (GT) plant also features production of process considerable growth in terms of capacity installed com- heat, for heating, cooling, desalination or other activities. pared to 2015 data. In 2016 globally the hydropower capac- Therefore, it is not ecient to design a CSP ST plant requir- ity has been 1,096 GW (in 2015 1,071 GW), the bio-power ing a signicant NG combustion. capacity has been 112 GW (in 2015 106 GW), the geother- The ST technology oers theoretically higher e- mal power capacity has been 13.5 GW, (in 2015 13 GW), the ciency because of higher temperature. However, the tech- CSP capacity has been 4.8 GW (in 2015 4.7 GW). Conversely nology is also more demanding from economic and tech- in 2016 the global wind power capacity has been 487 GW, nical view-points. While ST plants are certainly less more than 10% higher than the year before (433 GW) and widespread than PT plants [6], there is an open debate in the global solar PV capacity has been 303 GW, almost 40% the literature about which CSP technology may have the more than the 2015 value of 228 GW. The installed capacity better perspectives. of CSP is only about 1.5% of the total solar power capac- The world largest CSP plant, Ivanpah Solar Electric ity, where the installed capacity of PV is 98.5% of the total Generating System (ISEGS) uses ST technology. ISEGS is solar power capacity. made up of three installations one close to the other. The As explained in Ref. [8], the installed capacity (power) second largest CSP project in the world, the Solar Energy is particularly misleading in case of solar if used to indi- Generating Systems (SEGS) facility, is based on PT. This cate the actual annual production of electricity (energy) project is made up of 8 dierent installations presently op- by these systems, as the capacity factors (electricity pro- erational. The net capacity of ISEGS is 377 MW, while the duced divided by the product of the installed capacity by net capacity of Solar Energy Generating Systems (SEGS) the number of hours in a year) of recent CSP plants, for ex- SEGS II-IX is 340 MW. Both facilities use NG to boost the ample ISEGS [12–15], are only about 20%, even conceding electricity production. ISEGS uses NG in a greater extent the benet of a production boost by combustion of NG. than the SEGS facilities. Both ISEGS and SEGS lack of TES. In terms of energy, according to the International En- The actual capacity factors (ϵ) of both installations (elec- ergy Agency [10], the 2014 World electricity generation has tricity produced in a year divided by the product of net ca- been 23,816 TWh, with Coal/Peat providing the 40.8%, NG pacity by number of hours in a year) is about 20% disre- the 21.6%, Hydro the 16.4%, Nuclear the 10.6%, Oil the garding the boost by combustion of NG, which is however 4.3%, and Others, including all the Renewables the 6.3%. not negligible as shown in [8] and here further discussed. This 6.3% is mostly wind. Presently, the total solar elec- The global market of CSP is dominated by PT plants, tricity generation in the world is only 1.05% of the total. about 90% of all the CSP plants [6]. As per [6], back in According to the United States Energy Information Admin- 2010 the ST component of CSP was overshadowed by the istration [11], the net generation in the United States dur- PT component, accounting for more than 90% of the to- ing 2015 has been 31.2% by coal, 34.7% by NG, 20.2% nu- tal CSP installed capacity. The situation has not drastically clear, 6.7% by conventional hydroelectric, 5.7% by wind, changed since then [7]. The majority of the larger CSP plant and 1.4% all solar. As CSP plants only represent 1.5% of the projects under development/under construction are based worldwide installed capacity of solar electricity plants, the on the solar tower conguration. total CSP contribution to the global energy mix is therefore The CSP technologies presently do not compete on less than 0.02% [7, 10]. The situation in the United States price with photovoltaics (PV) solar panels that have pro- is not far from the world average. The contribution by CSP gressed massively in recent years because of the decreas- ST is then an even smaller 0.002%.
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