Silicon Carbide Solar Receiver for Residential Scale Concentrated Solar Power

Author(s):  
Matthew Neber ◽  
Hohyun Lee

The benefits of Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) systems include the ability to use them in combined cycles such as Combined Cooling Heat and Power (CCHP), and direct AC power generation. While this is done with success for utility scale power production, there are currently no systems offering this for residential scale, distributable power systems. In prior research, a low-cost high-temperature cavity receiver for a wide variety of applications was developed by employing silicon carbide [1]. The proposed design takes advantage of exclusive manufacturing techniques for ceramics such as machining in the green state and sintering multiple simple parts together to form a single complex part. Serious consideration has gone into designing a receiver that will be universally compatible with a number of applications. Some applications include using the receiver in a combined cycle power generation, as a chemical reactor, or for combined heat and power. The focus of this research is to analyze system metrics for a CCHP dish-Brayton system that is feasible for residential scale use. Preliminary research shows that an adequately sized system could provide a single family home with 2.5 kW of electricity and another 7 kW of process heating that could be used for absorption chilling or hot water and space heating. Cost analysis on the system will be performed to quantify its economic viability. Results on the analysis for multiple process heating applications will be presented along with the proposed design.

2013 ◽  
Vol 281 ◽  
pp. 554-562 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ting Ting Li ◽  
Guo Qiang Xu ◽  
Yong Kai Quan

Solar energy utilization has met some complicated problems in recent years, like energy storage, solar thermal power generation dispatchability and grid connection etc. The concept of hybrid solar power systems proposed in early researches has extended the conditions of exploiting solar power generation technology,this paper reviews hybrid solar power system technologies in the past 40 years. According to different complementary energy resources, hybrid solar/renewable energy and solar/conventional energy systems have been discussed in this paper. Particularly, this article presents the thermal and economic performances of Integrated Solar Combined Cycle System (ISCCS).


Author(s):  
Nicolas Calvet ◽  
Guilhem Dejean ◽  
Lucía Unamunzaga ◽  
Xavier Py

The ambitious DOE SunShot cost target ($0.06/kWh) for concentrated solar power (CSP) requires innovative concepts in the collector, receiver, and power cycle subsystems, as well as in thermal energy storage (TES). For the TES, one innovative approach is to recycle waste from metallurgic industry, called slags, as low-cost high-temperature thermal energy storage material. The slags are all the non-metallic parts of cast iron which naturally rises up by lower density at the surface of the fusion in the furnace. Once cooled down some ceramic can be obtained mainly composed of oxides of calcium, silicon, iron, and aluminum. These ceramics are widely available in USA, about 120 sites in 32 States and are sold at a very low average price of $5.37/ton. The US production of iron and steel slag was estimated at 19.7 million tons in 2003 which guarantees a huge availability of material. In this paper, electric arc furnace (EAF) slags from steelmaking industry, also called “black slags”, were characterized in the range of temperatures of concentrated solar power. The raw material is thermo-chemically stable up to 1100 °C and presents a low cost per unit thermal energy stored ($0.21/kWht for ΔT = 100 °C) and a suitable heat capacity per unit volume of material (63 kWht/m3for ΔT = 100°C). These properties should enable the development of new TES systems that could achieve the TES targets of the SunShot (temperature above 600 °C, installed cost below $15/kWht, and heat capacity ≥25 kWht/m3). The detailed experimental results are presented in the paper. After its characterization, the material has been shaped in form of plates and thermally cycled in a TES system using hot-air as heat transfer fluid. Several cycles of charge and discharged were performed successfully and the concept was validated at laboratory scale. Apart from availability, low-cost, and promising thermal properties, the use of slag promotes the conservation of natural resources and is a noble solution to decrease the cost and to develop sustainable TES systems.


2022 ◽  
pp. 361-398
Author(s):  
Mohamed E. Zayed ◽  
Ammar H. Elsheikh ◽  
F.A. Essa ◽  
Ahmed Mohamed Elbanna ◽  
Wenjia Li ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Tadashi Tsuji

Air cooling blades are usually applied to gas turbines as a basic specification. This blade cooling air is almost 20% of compressor suction air and it means that a great deal of compression load is not converted effectively to turbine power generation. This paper proposes the CCM (Cascade Cooling Module) system of turbine blade air line and the consequent improvement of power generation, which is achieved by the reduction of cooling air consumption with effective use of recovered heat. With this technology, current gas turbines (TIT: turbine inlet temperature: 1350°C) can be up-rated to have a relative high efficiency increase. The increase ratio has a potential to be equivalent to that of 1500°C Class GT/CC against 1350°C Class. The CCM system is designed to enable the reduction of blade cooling air consumption by the low air temperature of 15°C instead of the usual 200–400°C. It causes the turbine operating air to increase at the constant suction air condition, which results in the enhancement of power and thermal efficiency. The CCM is installed in the cooling air line and is composed of three stage coolers: steam generator/fuel preheater stage, heat exchanger stage for hot water supplying and cooler stage with chilled water. The coolant (chilled water) for downstream cooler is produced by an absorption refrigerator operated by the hot water of the upstream heat exchanger. The proposed CCM system requires the modification of cooling air flow network in the gas turbine but produces the direct effect on performance enhancement. When the CCM system is applied to a 700MW Class CC (Combined Cycle) plant (GT TIT: 135°C Class), it is expected that there will be a 40–80MW increase in power and +2–5% relative increase in thermal efficiency.


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