Performance of the world’s first integrated gas turbine–solar particle heating and energy storage system

Abstract

• A proof-of-concept gas turbine–solar particle heating hybrid system was developed. • The particle heating receiver is able to heat the falling particles up to 720 °C. • Harnessing solar energy was demonstrated. • Utilizing the stored thermal energy during off-sun operation was demonstrated. • Excessive heat loss was traced and estimated. The world’s first integrated gas turbine–solar particle heating hybrid system has been realized on the campus of King Saud University (KSU), Saudi Arabia. The system was built and tested as a proof-of-concept, such that, upon successful completion of the test, a larger, commercial-scale system can be built with confidence. The successful execution of this project has yielded the following important observations: (1) the particle’s central receiver system can heat the falling particles to 720 °C; (2) the hybrid system can store solar thermal energy in particles and transfer this energy (via a particle-to-working-fluid heat exchanger) to the compressed air before entering the microturbine.; (3) the microturbine can still operate using the stored thermal energy even after the solar field was shut down; (4) although the temperature rise of the compressed air across the heat exchanger was not high, it was adequate to prove the system’s ability to use the particles’ stored energy as a heat source.