FUTURE SUSTAINABLE CONCENTRATING SOLAR POWER TECHNOLOGIES: A TECHNO-ECONOMICAL STUDY

The present study is a continuation of a previous work which titled by “Future
sustainable Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) technologies: a review”
. Electricity production,
HVAC and the production of safe drinking water constitute the major needs of developing
countries. Consequently, the bulk of this new CSP capacity is expected to be seen in the MENA
region, where it has abundant solar radiation, cheap land and high electricity demand. In this
paper, the techno-economical study of using large scale CSP plant for electricity generation in
Riyadh, KSA is investigated. Two cases are proposed for present and future applications. The first
case (Case-1) is using parabolic trough (PT) solar field coupled with steam turbo-generator rated at
capacity of 100MWe.The second case (Case-2) is using Solar tower/heliostats solar field coupled
with gas turbo-generator at rated capacity of 100MWe system which is proposed for future
application in desert areas. Then a parametric study was done to investigate the best economic
TES hours for both cases. Finally the optimum condition of both cases is compared. The results
showed that the estimated average annual electricity is 363,892 MWhe, 341,456MWhe for case-1
and case-2 respectively. Thus achieving a conversion efficiency of 18.67%, 14.87% for case-1 and
case-2 respectively. The financial results showed that: for case-1, LCOEnominal is 16.97,
21.8Cent/KWhe at interest rate of 3%, 6% respectively. While for cas-2: the LCOEnominal is 15.54,
19.68 Cent/KWhe at interest rate of 3%, 6% respectively, which is still high comparing to the
current electricity cost in KSA. Also, the minimum LCOE was obtained at 6hrs thermal energy
storage for both cases. Finally, when carrying out feasibility studies for CSP plants, attention must
be paid to fund at low interest rate, and local manufacturing for some items of the solar field. This
can achieve a significant reduction in the LCOE.