Life cycle assessment of greenhouse gas emissions, water and land use for concentrated solar power plants with different energy backup systems

Klein, Sharon; Rubin, Edward S.

doi:10.1016/j.enpol.2013.08.057

Cited by 79 publications

(52 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is an appropriate methodology to evaluate the environmental performance of renewable technologies, as has been proven in scientific literature [7][8][9]. The environmental impacts of conventional CSP plants have been previously evaluated by the scientific community [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. These analyses are all based on LCA methodology, and evaluate the environmental performance of CSP plants of varying capacity, operating with different technologies (parabolic trough/Fresnel reflectors, central tower, Stirling dish), including specific component characteristics (air/wet cooling, thermal storage technology) and hybridization with different fuels.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment of a HYSOL Concentrated Solar Power Plant: Analyzing the Effect of Geographic Location

2016

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Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) technology is developing in order to achieve higher energy efficiency, reduced economic costs, and improved firmness and dispatchability in the generation of power on demand. To this purpose, a research project titled HYSOL has developed a new power plant, consisting of a combined cycle configuration with a 100 MWe steam turbine and an 80 MWe gas-fed turbine with biomethane. Technological developments must be supported by the identification, quantification, and evaluation of the environmental impacts produced. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the environmental performance of a CSP plant based on HYSOL technology using a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology while considering different locations. The scenarios investigated include different geographic locations (Spain, Chile, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Mexico, and South Africa), an alternative modelling procedure for biomethane, and the use of natural gas as an alternative fuel. Results indicate that the geographic location has a significant influence on the environmental profile of the HYSOL CSP plant. The results obtained for the HYSOL configuration located in different countries presented significant differences (between 35% and 43%, depending on the category), especially in climate change and water stress categories. The differences are mainly attributable to the local availability of solar and water resources and composition of the national electricity mix. In addition, HYSOL technology performs significantly better when hybridizing with biomethane instead of natural gas. This evidence is particularly relevant in the climate change category, where biomethane hybridization emits 27.9-45.9 kg CO 2 eq per MWh (depending on the biomethane modelling scenario) and natural gas scenario emits 264 kg CO 2 eq/MWh.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Life Cycle Assessment of a HYSOL Concentrated Solar Power Plant: Analyzing the Effect of Geographic Location

2016

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“…This top-down approach then aggregates the impacts from the various sectors involved in a product or process. The weakness in this method is the risk of generalization due to the categorization of economic sectors [16].…”

Section: Other Assessment Methods Used For Electricity Generation Tecmentioning

confidence: 99%

Initial review and analysis of the direct environmental impacts of CSP in the northern Cape, South Africa

Rudman

Gauché

Esler

2016

AIP Conference Proceedings

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“…The second issue is about the oil lifetime. Because of their degradation with temperature, synthetic oils already need to be frequently changed [4]. Their contact with solid materials may result in faster aging and solid material degradation.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Compatibility tests between Jarytherm® DBT synthetic oil and solid materials from wastes

Fasquelle

Falcoz

Neveu

et al. 2016

AIP Conference Proceedings

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Abstract. Direct thermocline thermal energy storage is the cheapest sensible thermal energy storage configuration. Indeed, a thermocline tank consists in one tank instead of two and reduces costs. Thermocline thermal energy storages are often filled with cheap solid materials which could react with the heat transfer fluid in the case of incompatibility. PROMES laboratory is building a pilot-scale parabolic trough solar loop including a direct thermocline thermal energy storage system. The working fluid will be a synthetic oil, the Jarytherm ® DBT, and the thermal energy storage tank will be filled with stabilized solid materials elaborated from vitrified wastes. Compatibility tests have been conducted in order to check on one hand if the thermo-mechanical properties and life time of the energy storage medium are not affected by the contact with oil and, on the other hand, if the thermal oil performances are not degraded by the solid filler. These experiments consisted in putting in contact the oil and the solid materials in small tanks. In order to discriminate the solid materials tested in the shortest time, accelerating aging conditions at 330 °C for 500 hours were used. The measurements consisted in X-Ray Diffraction and Scanning Electron Microscopy for the solids, and thermo-physical and chemical properties measurements for the oil. Regarding the solid samples, their crystalline structure did not change during the test, but it is difficult to conclude about their elementary composition and they seem to absorb oil. While thermal properties still makes Jarytherm ® DBT a good heat transfer fluid after the accelerated aging tests, this study results in differentiating most compatible materials. Thus according to our study, Jarytherm ® DBT can be used in direct thermocline thermal energy storage applications when compatibility of the solid material has been demonstrated.

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Life cycle assessment of greenhouse gas emissions, water and land use for concentrated solar power plants with different energy backup systems

Cited by 79 publications

References 18 publications

Life Cycle Assessment of a HYSOL Concentrated Solar Power Plant: Analyzing the Effect of Geographic Location

Life Cycle Assessment of a HYSOL Concentrated Solar Power Plant: Analyzing the Effect of Geographic Location

Initial review and analysis of the direct environmental impacts of CSP in the northern Cape, South Africa

Compatibility tests between Jarytherm® DBT synthetic oil and solid materials from wastes

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