Molten Salt Power Tower Cost Model for the System Advisor Model (SAM)

Technical Report · Fri Feb 01 04:00:00 EST 2013

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1067902· OSTI ID:1067902

Turchi, Craig S. ^[1]; Heath, Garvin A. ^[1]

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1. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)

This report describes a component-based cost model developed for molten-salt power tower solar power plants. The cost model was developed by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), using data from several prior studies, including a contracted analysis from WorleyParsons Group, which is included herein as an Appendix. The WorleyParsons' analysis also estimated material composition and mass for the plant to facilitate a life cycle analysis of the molten salt power tower technology. Details of the life cycle assessment have been published elsewhere. The cost model provides a reference plant that interfaces with NREL's System Advisor Model or SAM. The reference plant assumes a nominal 100-MWe (net) power tower running with a nitrate salt heat transfer fluid (HTF). Thermal energy storage is provided by direct storage of the HTF in a two-tank system. The design assumes dry-cooling. The model includes a spreadsheet that interfaces with SAM via the Excel Exchange option in SAM. The spreadsheet allows users to estimate the costs of different-size plants and to take into account changes in commodity prices. This report and the accompanying Excel spreadsheet can be downloaded at https://sam.nrel.gov/cost.

• Research Organization: National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Solar Energy Technologies Office
• DOE Contract Number: AC36-08GO28308
• OSTI ID: 1067902
• Report Number(s): NREL/TP--5500-57625
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

14 SOLAR ENERGY
97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING
CSP
Energy Analysis
MOLTEN SALT
POWER TOWER
SAM
SOLAR
SYSTEM ADVISOR MODEL
Solar Energy Thermal