Solar thermal power plants - A review of configurations and performance comparison

A detailed review and thermal performance comparison of fifteen power generation technologies including fossil, solar and hybrid options has been presented. The modeling of each part of the power plants has been carried out. For the solar field, a detailed modeling that comprises the heat transfer in the receiver tube, optics of the collector and the heat losses from the piping, has been carried out. In order to develop mathematical models for the fifteen power plants, the gas turbine and the steam turbine have been modeled and results were successively validated. Various integration of solar parabolic trough technology into the three reference Power Conversion Cycles (PCSs) including Brayton cycle, Rankine cycle and combined cycle have been considered. Six performance indicators have been used to rank the configurations. Some of these configurations are originally proposed in the present study and important findings are highlighted.