SOLAR THERMAL PLANT

DRIVEN BY SUPERCRITICAL
CARBON DIOXIDE

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Concentrated
Solar Thermal
The Technology:
Plant technology can be used
to run a supercritical CO2
driven power cycle which is
expected to increase efficiency
and
applicability
of
solar
power.
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Concentrated Solar Thermal Plant

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Contributed by PPDC

CSP Technology Process

Types of Solar Concentrator/Collector

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Power Tower CSP

Solar power tower convert sunshine
into clean electricity. The technology
uses many large, sun-tracking
mirrors commonly referred to as
heliostats to focus sunlight on a
receiver at the top of a tower.
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Tubular and Volumetric

Receiver

Principle of volumetric air receiver [Hoffschmidt et al. (2003)]

Types of Volumetric Receivers :

a) Closed volumetric receiver
b) Open volumetric receiver

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Closed and open

volumetric air receivers

Closed air receiver

ource: Avila-Marin, Solar Energy, 2011 Open air receiver

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Power Cycle:
Compared to organic and steam-based
Rankine cycle systems, s-CO2 Brayton
cycle can achieve high efficiencies over
a wide temperature range of heat
sources with compact components
resulting in a smaller system footprint,
lower capital and operating costs.
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Brayton Power Cycle

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Supercritical CO2 as Working Fluid

Low critical temperature and
pressure
Single phase working fluid
High power density, hence size of
machinery is reduced
Less thermal fatigue
Non-inflammable, less corrosive and
environmentally stable and safeContributed by PPDC

Contributed by PPDC

Super Critical
CO2 Power
Cycle

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Steam
turbine
usually has
10-15 rotor
stages where
as in S-Co2
turbine it is 45 rotor stage

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TAC Module
(source: Sandia
Supercritical CO2
Cycle Loop Test)

S-CO2 Based Solar Thermal Power Plant

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State of Art
NREL (National Renewable Energy Laboratory)
has started a 10 MW Supercritical-CO2 Turbine
Project with the support from Echogen Power
Systems, Dresser-Rand, Abengoa Solar, Sandia
National Laboratories, the University of
Wisconsin, Barber-Nichols Inc., and the Electric
Power Research Institute. The project is
expected to be completed by 2019.
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State of Art
Sandia National Laboratories and Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory are involved
with Toshiba, Echogen, Dresser Rand, GE,
Barber-Nichols in working out the most
efficient S-CO2 power cycles. Moreover Sandia
National Lab is also focussing on system and
metallurgical studies for the heat exchangers
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Contributed by PPDC