Analysis of air return alternatives for CRS-type open volumetric reciever

Ma.Jesús Marcos, Manuel Romero and Silvia Palero

Energy, 2004, vol. 29, issue 5, 677-686

Abstract: Even though air-cooled receivers provide substantial benefits, such as low inertia and quick sun-following dispatchability, and the volumetric effect leads to designs with aperture areas similar to those used in molten salt or water/steam receivers, some concern persists regarding absorber durability, reduction of radiation losses and improvement of the air return ratio (ARR). The paper focuses on this last issue, since the ARR is a source of significant receiver losses in current designs. Today’s scaled-up receivers claim values between 45 and 70% for ARR, which means, in terms of energy loss, between 5 and 15%. As a consequence of ARR and the radiation loss stemming from high working temperatures, open volumetric receivers efficiencies below 75% are reported at temperatures usable by the power block. Those values may be acceptable for a first demonstration plant, but are categorically not competitive for commercial schemes in which receiver efficiency should approach 90%. This paper discusses the impact of several geometrical properties of the absorber and air injection system used. The study was performed by CFD with the FLUENT code. The assessment considered such alternatives as modularity of the air return system (HITREC receiver concept), outer ring injection with air curtain effect or cavity aperture (with and without secondary concentrator). A detailed analysis reveals that some parts of the receiver aperture achieve an ARR above 90% at well-selected operating conditions, but average values hardly surpass 70%. Therefore, a careful design should keep in mind important variables such as the effects of receiver edge and lateral wind, as well as air injection angle.

Date: 2004
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360544203001762
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:29:y:2004:i:5:p:677-686

DOI: 10.1016/S0360-5442(03)00176-2

Access Statistics for this article

Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser

More articles in Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().