Multi-temporal resolution aerosols impacted techno-economic assessment of concentrated solar power in arid regions: Case study of solar power tower in Kuwait

Abstract

This work evaluates the Solar Power Tower performance in arid regions where elevated aerosols levels and water scarcity threaten solar applications feasibility. The work conducts an aerosols aware modelling and techno-economic assessment by considering possible aerosols effects on the solar field’s reflected irradiance; an effect that is typically ignored in the literature. Aerosols effect inclusion’s modifies the thermal input to the solar field and this, in turn, provides a more accurate assessment. A parametric analysis has been performed using a 50 MW model by varying the Thermal Energy Storage and Solar Multiple based on three aerosols temporal resolutions: a typical year’s average, daily and no-aerosols schemes. Further, water consumption is examined over four different condenser scenarios: dry, wet and two hybrid set ups. The assessment performed in Kuwait reveals that the wet-cooled condenser scenario with a 16h of storage and a solar multiple of 3.2 yields the lowest Levelized Cost of Energy of 12.06 $/kWh when the no-aerosols scheme is considered. This increases to 12.87 $/kWh when the daily aerosols are considered as the generated energy decreases by 6.7%. Besides, both hybrid condenser scenarios offer a trade-off as they result in a 55.1–68.7% of water saving for only 2.1–2.3% less energy generation.