A Review of Ammonia-Based Thermochemical Energy Storage for Concentrating Solar Power

“…Ammonia has been demonstrated as a solar thermochemical storage medium over three decades of research at Australian National University (ANU), achieving a 24-hour demonstration of a complete system, with dish concentrator, endothermic and exothermic reactors, and storage vessel [3]. The exothermic reactor achieved wall temperatures of 475°C, demonstrating that it could be used to heat steam for electricity generation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thermochemical energy storage with ammonia: Aiming for the sunshot cost target

Lavine

Lovegrove²,

Jordan³

et al. 2016

AIP Conference Proceedings

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(2016)Abstract. Thermochemical energy storage has the potential to reduce the cost of concentrating solar thermal power. This paper presents recent advances in ammonia-based thermochemical energy storage (TCES), supported by an award from the U.S. Dept. of Energy SunShot program. Advances have been made in three areas: identification of promising approaches for underground containment of the gaseous products of the dissociation reaction, demonstration that ammonia synthesis can be used to generate steam for a supercritical-steam Rankine cycle, and a preliminary design for integration of the endothermic reactors within a tower receiver. Based on these advances, ammonia-based TCES shows promise to meet the $15/kWh t SunShot cost target.

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“…This shortfall is offset by the fact that the reaction has no problematic side reactions, is a very mature process having been studied for more than 100 yr, and requires lower receiver temperatures, which results in higher receiver efficiency and allows the use of less expensive concentrators [7]. The ammonia storage system has already been successfully tested by the Australian National University (ANU), with a solar input of up to 15 kW [8][9][10]. The ANU system used a dish concentrator to provide heat input for the endothermic ammonia dissociation reaction and used the heat output of the exothermic ammonia synthesis reaction to heat air.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Efficiency of Solar Electricity Production With Long-Term Storage

Shakeri

Soltanzadeh

Berson

et al. 2014

Journal of Solar Energy Engineering

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Solar electric production systems with energy storage were simulated and compared, including an ammonia thermochemical cycle, compressed air energy storage (CAES), pumped hydroelectric energy storage (PHES), vanadium flow battery, and thermal energy storage (TES). All systems used the same parabolic concentrator to collect solar energy and Stirling engine to produce electricity. Efficiency and storage losses were modeled after existing experiments. At receiver and ammonia synthesis temperatures of 800 K, efficiencies of all systems except TES were initially similar at 17-19%, while TES provided $23%. Further, TES was most efficient for diurnal-scale storage. However, lower time-dependent storage losses caused the ammonia system to have the highest efficiency after one month of storage and to be increasingly favored as time of storage increased. Solar electric production with full capacity factor may be most efficient with a combination of systems including direct solar-electric production and systems with both diurnal and long-term storage.

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A Review of Ammonia-Based Thermochemical Energy Storage for Concentrating Solar Power

Cited by 106 publications

References 48 publications

A review of promising candidate reactions for chemical heat storage

A review of promising candidate reactions for chemical heat storage

Thermochemical energy storage with ammonia: Aiming for the sunshot cost target

Efficiency of Solar Electricity Production With Long-Term Storage

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