Integrated assessment for solar-assisted carbon capture and storage power plant by adopting resilience thinking on energy system

Abstract

Integrating solar-thermal energy into the power plant with post-combustion carbon capture and storage can reduce the energy penalty derived from solvent regeneration. However, few metrics exist to evaluate the trade-off associated with technic, economic and ecological perspectives for different integration schemes of the three subsystems, namely the solar field, power plant and carbon capture system. This paper analysis five configurations of coal-fired power plant with and without solar field as well as CCS technology based on the resilience concept. Still at the budding stage, the status of resilience definitions and evaluation methods related to energy system is reviewed.The resilience level for five configurations of coal-fired power plant both with and without solar-field, together with the CCS system is measured, which takes into consideration five critical characteristics towards resilience: fossil fuel depletion potential (CADP), global warming potential (GWP), levelized cost of energy (LCOE), solar to electricity fraction and spare capacity. Results indicate that among all the configurations, the solar-assisted power generation CCS power plant with 90% capture rate shows the highest resilience level. However, the scheme which utilizes solar energy to assisted solvent regeneration, shows limited advantage in terms of resilience level due to high CADP and LCOE.