The EuroTrough technology, developed by sbp sonne, has been selected for China's newest CSP power plant in Tibet. sbp sonne will provide the technology and engineering service for this challenging site at an elevation of 4,500 meters in the Tibet Autonomous Region of...
innovation
Published at Solar Energy – Techno-economic assessment of a numbering-up approach for a 100 MWe third generation sodium-salt CSP system
Abstract: This work presents the design and techno-economic analysis of a 100 MWe concentrated solar power (CSP) system using a supercritical CO2 power block with 700 °C input temperature. Aiming to leverage the relatively higher efficiency of small heliostat fields...
What happened with Crescent Dunes?
The Crescent Dunes CSP project in the US was the first of a kind: The first tower CSP with thermal energy storage at full-scale; 110 MW. (Above about 150 MW, the distances of the solar field encircling the tower receiver has optical limits) It was developed by the...
Published – Technical, economic and environmental analysis of solar thermochemical production of drop-in fuels
Abstract: This study analyzes the technical performance, costs and life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of the production of various fuels using air-captured water and CO2, and concentrated solar energy as the source of high-temperature process heat. The solar...
Published at Chemistry of Materials – Synthesis and Structural Study of Substituted Ternary Nitrides for Ammonia Production
Abstract: Over the past few decades, inorganic nitride materials have grown in importance in part due to their potential as catalysts for the synthesis of NH3, a key ingredient in fertilizer and precursor to industrial chemicals. Of particular interest are the ternary...
Australian mining to decarbonize with GlassPoint’s solar steam
Ten years ago, GlassPoint CEO Rod MacGregor bucked the typical business plan for solar developers, both PV and CSP (How CSP works): Sign an electricity contract with an electric utility to sell your solar power by the kilowatt-hour for 25 years and try to get...
Published at Energies – A Novel Dual Receiver–Storage Design for Concentrating Solar Thermal Plants Using Beam-Down Optics
Abstract: Advanced power cycles—such as the supercritical carbon dioxide (sCO2) cycle—have the potential to reduce the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of concentrated solar thermal power (CST) plants by significantly boosting their overall solar-to-electric...
Registration open for September: SFERA-III Doctoral Colloquium and Summer School
𝗥𝗲𝗴𝗶𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝟰𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝗙𝗘𝗥𝗔-𝗜𝗜𝗜 𝗗𝗼𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗖𝗼𝗹𝗹𝗼𝗾𝘂𝗶𝘂𝗺 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗦𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗿 𝗦𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗼𝗹 📅 11 – 15 September 2023 🔎 Focus topic summer school: Smart CSP: how smart tools, devices and software can help improve the design and operation of concentrating solar power technologies. 🗣 💻 DLR...
US DOE funds Synhelion to scale up its solar thermal hydrogen
Solar hydrogen is a component of the thermochemical solar fuels that Synhelion is developing commercially, such as aviation fuel The solar thermal green hydrogen technology beginning to be commercialized by Synhelion has now received a nod from the US DOE with funding...
US DOE announces $135 million industrial decarbonization awards
40 Projects Across 21 States Will Advance Technologies to Decarbonize American Industry and Help Create Good-Paying Jobs WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced $135 million for 40 projects that will reduce carbon pollution from the...
Published at Solar Compass – Pathways to the use of concentrated solar heat for high temperature industrial processes
Abstract: New analysis is presented identifying strong potential for Concentrating Solar Thermal technology (CST) to be a cost-effective contributor to future sources of net zero-emissions, high temperature industrial process heat relative to other emerging options....
Published at Applied Catalysis – Structured sulphur trioxide splitting catalytic systems and allothermally-heated reactors for the implementation of Sulphur-based thermochemical cycles via a centrifugal solar particle receiver
Abstract: Catalytic sulphur trioxide splitting is the highest-temperature (850–900 °C), endothermic step of several sulphur-based thermochemical cycles targeted to production of hydrogen or solid sulphur. The demonstrated capability of centrifugal particle solar...
Oxygen fix for high-temperature molten-salt degradation (and corrosion) at 620°C
The molten salt mixture deployed in today’s commercial CSP plants for thermal energy storage is liquid at 565°C and degrades at higher temperatures. Yet higher temperatures would increase thermal efficiency. So how can we develop a molten salt mix that can reach...
Cascaded thermocline storage with metal wool gets test: HYBRIDplus
Three years ago, Abengoa thermal energy storage engineer Cristina Prieto exchanged the relatively secretive world of commercial CSP for academia. Now, as the professor for a newly created thermal energy storage discipline at the School of Engineering at the University...
Water-cooled window for hot solar receivers over 1500°C
Goal: ensure the quartz window never exceeds 300°C, despite solar receiver temperatures above 1500°C – keeping thermal efficiency over 50%
Successful PROMES-CNRS thermocline test of latent/sensible heat storage
A solar thermal energy storage breakthrough – single tank thermal energy storage avoiding thermocline thickening has been tested successfully
Published at Progress in Energy and Combustion Science – Opportunities and challenges in using particle circulation loops for concentrated solar power applications
Abstract: Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) is an electricity generation technology that concentrates solar irradiance through heliostats onto a small area, the receiver, where a heat transfer medium, currently a fluid (HTF), is used as heat carrier towards the heat...
Sandia breaks ground on its Gen-3 particle-based CSP tech demo
The pilot at Sandia will demonstrate its next-generation high-temperature concentrated solar technology that can be used for energy storage, power production, industrial process heat, or solar fuel production. Press Release WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of...
50 MW Hami Tower CSP project with novel STELLIO heliostats commissioned in China
[Ed: the novel STELLIO heliostats seen here, and used in this Hami Tower CSP project, won the SolarPACES Innovation Award for 2015] MASERMIC and SBP Sonne have completed the commissioning of the 50MW HAMI tower solar plant located in CHINA, XINJIANG province. It is...
Are there still careers in solar energy innovation?
Tower CSP needs talented engineers in optics, robotics and AI to advance heliostat technology and cut costs.
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