Assessment of Solar Power Tower Driven Ultrasupercritical Steam Cycles Applying Tubular Central Receivers With Varied Heat Transfer Media

For clean and efficient electric power generation, the combination of solar power towers (SPTs) with ultrasupercritical steam cycle power plants could be the next development step. The methodology of the European concentrated solar thermal roadmap study was used to predict the annual performance and the cost reduction potential of this option applying tubular receivers with various appropriate high temperature heat transfer media (HTM). For the assessment, an analytical model of the heat transfer in a parametric 360 deg cylindrical and tubular central receiver was developed to examine the receiver’s efficiency characteristics. The receiver’s efficiency characteristics, which are based on different irradiation levels relative to the receiver’s design point, are, then, used to interpolate the receiver’s thermal efficiency in an hourly based annual calculation of one typical year that is defined by hourly based real measurements of the direct normal irradiance and the ambient temperature. Applying appropriate cost assumptions from literature, the levelized electricity costs (LEC) were estimated for each considered SPT concept and compared with the reference case, which is a scale-up of the state of the art molten salt concept. The power level of all compared concepts and the reference case is $50MWel$⁠. The sensitivity of the specific cost assumptions for the LEC was evaluated for each concept variation. No detailed evaluation was done for the thermal storage but comparable costs were assumed for all cases. The results indicate a significant cost reduction potential of up to 15% LEC reduction in the liquid metal HTM processes. Due to annual performance based parametric studies of the number of receiver panels and storage capacity, the results also indicate the optimal values of these parameters concerning minimal LEC.