Informe de Grecia

The economic model is based on specific costs for the major components of the plant. In this section, first costs for the rock bed TES system as well as the local fossil fuel and land cost are specified. Afterwards the remaining components’ costs are presented as derived from the SOLGATE Project Report (2005) and the ECOSTAR Roadmap Document (Pitz-Paal et al., 2005).

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 105

110 115 120

Bed length, LTES [m]

QTES /V TES [kW t h /m 3 ]

Figure 2.5: Storage capacity per volume of rock bed over bed length

Specific TES system cost

The specific capital cost of the TES system is estimated at 11.5 USD/(kWth).

This value was derived for a conservative design in a rock bed concept com- parison by Allen and von Backström (2016). Two other investigated concepts are predicted by the authors to lower this price below 5 USD/(kWth). All of

these values compare very favorably to cost forecasts of two-tank molten salt storage systems (for example by Kolb, 2011) which predict a specific cost of 25 USD/(kWth).

The TES capacity used as the reference for the specific cost by Allen and von Backström (2016) is the amount of retrievable energy once cyclic thermocline stability has been reached. To calculate costs of TES systems implemented into the plants of this study (not for operating the TES), the procedure by Allen and von Backström (2016) is repeated: The storage is charged with hot air at 600◦_{C until the air outlet temperature increases to 45}◦_{C. Discharging is done}

with cold air at a temperature of 20◦_{Cuntil the air outlet temperature drops}

below 550◦_{C. The air mass flux during charging and discharging is 0.1 kg/m}2_s

and 0.2 kg/m2_{s, respectively. The charging-discharging cycle is repeated 80}

times, at which time thermocline stability was achieved.

The calculated specific storage capacity per volume of rock for storage diameters between 17 m and 32 m and bed length between 2 m and 12 m over the storage length is depicted in Figure 2.5. There is no dependence of the capacity on the storage diameter as the mass flux is kept constant. The capacity per volume increases slightly from approximately 108 kWth/m3 to 118 kWth/m3

for longer bed length, which is caused by the decreasing fraction of unused bed length due to the thermocline region. To decrease the computational time of simulations, the specific capacity is universally set to a value of 118 kWth/m3

in the economic model.

The found capacities are approximately half of the amount of thermal energy that could be retrieved from a bed completely heated to 600◦_{C. The}

2.1. MODEL OF THE SUNSPOT CYCLE 25

is, continued charging when the outlet air temperature rises — can thus double the effective capacity of the TES system.

Location-dependent costs

The fuel cost is based on a forecast by the South African Department of Energy (2013, p. 34) on which an annual cost increase equal to the South African inflation rate (6 %) was superimposed. As this price is based on the world market price for liquefied natural gas (LNG), it can be seen as an upper limit appropriate for countries without access to natural gas through pipelines.

The cost of land generally does not make up a large fraction of the investment cost of a CSP plant. The specific land cost of property located in proximity to Upington, as advertised on online property search engines, averages at below 0.02 USD/m2 _{which is two orders of magnitude lower than as defined in the}

ECOSTAR report for locations in southern Spain. Even if a considerable cost increase is applicable for property with good access to infrastructure (water, roads, electrical grid), the impact on the total cost will remain small.

Cost model for 2005

As most cost figures are derived from sources that are more than ten years old, the specific costs should be adjusted (a) for inflation and (b) for cost decreases due to innovation and increasing operating experience. The former can easily be calculated with the inflation data of the years since publication. However, technology cost decline prediction is disproportionately more difficult and associated with large uncertainty, especially because the core components of the technology are still in the development stage. The system comparison is, thus, based on non-adjusted cost information in 2005 United States dollar. All costs are converted to United States dollar at the time of their publication (where necessary) and those of the TES system, land, fuel and for operation and maintenance (O&M, derived from Kolb, 2011, Section 3.5) are adjusted for inflation to the year 2005 with data of the United States Department of Labor (2016). The used values for specific component costs are stated in Table 2.3.

An adjusted cost model that takes technology cost decrease through learning rates into account is presented in Appendix C. A surcharge of 20 % of the total investment cost is added for indirect costs (see Pitz-Paal et al., 2005).

The correlation given by Pitz-Paal et al. (2005, Figure 1-3) is used for calculating the LCOE

LCOE = (crf _{× CAPEX + OPEX ) /E}a, (2.1.15)

wherein CAPEX and OPEX represent the capital and operational expenditure (including insurance), respectively, and the fixed charge rate is calculated as

Table 2.3: Specific costs (in 2005-USD) of components (SOLGATE Project Report, 2005, tables 8 and 9; Pitz-Paal et al., 2005, tables 5-19–5-22); the constant for the cost calculation of the tower is part of an exponential equation dependent on its height

Component Cost Unit Relative to

TES system 9.50 USD/kWth TES capacity

HPRS 191 USD/kWt HPRS nominal rating

Brayton cycle 519 USD/kWe GTU nominal rating

Adaption of GT 1090 103 _{USD absolute}

Rankine cycle 729 USD/kWe cycle nominal rating

Solar field 160 USD/m2 _{mirror surface area}

Tower 484 103 _{USD constant in equation}

Control 605 103 _{USD absolute}

Annual O&M 58.6 USD/kWe installed total rating

The remaining input parameters include the annual interest rate kd = 8 %, the

plant lifetime of n = 30 years, and the annual insurance cost of 1.5 % (real) of the total plant investment cost (derived from Pitz-Paal et al., 2005, p. 13, and the SOLGATE Project Report, 2005, Section 4.5.4.1, respectively). A lower annual interest rate, as currently realistic for developed countries, would improve the viability of any CSP plant considerably. The used value is chosen for the South African economic environment.