Dual Receiver Concept for Solar Towers up to 100 MW

The dual receiver concept presented in this paper improves the adaptation of the central receiver to the steam cycle in a solar thermal power plant. By combination of an open volumetric air heater and a tubular evaporator the dual receiver concept profits from the advantages of these two concepts while their characteristic problems are avoided. The water is evaporated directly in the tubular steam generator; preheating and superheating are done in heat exchangers by using the hot air from the volumetric receiver. This paper presents a concept study that extends previous work on the $10MWel$ level (Buck et al., 2004, “Dual Receiver Concept for Solar Towers,” Proc. 12th Solar PACES Int. Symposium, Oct. 6–8, Oaxaca, Mexico) to a level of $100MWel$⁠, which is the expected power range of future plants. The results confirm the benefits of the new concept, resulting from higher thermal efficiency of the receiver and lower parasitic power consumption. The annual mean efficiency is increased from 13% to 16%. Advantageous are also the reduced thermal loads in the receiver components.