TOPCSP

In the proposed DN TOPCSP, we establish the overall research objective of improving the design of the different systems of a CSP plant to increase its cost-competitiveness, reliability, environmental profile, and operational safety. The research programme of this project is organised into three work packages:

1. Cost reduction and improved reliability of commercial CSP plants.
2. Next generation of CSP plants working with alternative fluids.
3. New scientific approaches and computational tools to generate disruptive innovation in CSP technologies.

These WPs will contribute to the overall research objective by:

• improving molten salt-based technology which has the lowest costs and higher capacity factors and the direct steam generation plants that are suitable at a lower scale (WP1),
• developing a high-temperature liquid receiver and the sCO2 power block of the next generation of CSP plants and proposing new systems to contribute to enhancing the flexibility of CSP plants using molten salt reservoirs and solar fuels (WP2), and
• developing computational tools (WP3) to improve the analysis and design of the systems considered in WPs 1-2.

WP1 comprises activities oriented towards increasing the efficiency of CSP plants working with conventional nitrate molten salt (Tasks 1.1-DC1 and 1.3-DC3) and lower size direct steam generation plants (Task 1.2-DC2). In WP2, high-temperature liquid receivers (Task 2.1-DC4), the power cycle to be integrated with this receiver (Task 2.2-DC5), and novel systems to enhance CSP system dispatchability such as an electrically heated molten salt reservoir and a reactor to produce solar fuels (Tasks 2.3-DC6 & 2.4-DC7) will be proposed and studied using simulations and experiments. WP3 develops new scientific approaches and computational tools to assist in the design, optimisation and evaluation of the environmental profile of CSP systems, (Task 3.1-DC8, Task 3.2-DC9, Task3.3-DC10)

The network will train 10 doctoral candidates (DCs) with the solid technical and scientific knowledge and transferable skills needed to contribute either from the academic or the industrial sector to the attaining these targets. TOPCSP, where different techniques (experimental and simulations) will be used to solve technical problems in different CSP plant subsystems (from the solar field to the power block).