Medium to High Temperature Solar Heat for Industrial Processes

Questions and Answers

ISES Webinar

Webinar Questions
What will be the area requirment for instllation of 1 Mw in India at 200C?

Responses during webinar

Replies from Christian Zahler

31 January 2014

Repies from Roberto Roman

3000 m2

Depends on the amount of dust and frequency of

the yearly efficiency graph from industrial solar: what was the effect of dust on the cleaning. The numbers in the slide are based on
simulations with a slightly reduced reflectivity of the
mirrors?
mirrors. If I remember right approx 3% reduced.
What are the limitations to integrate CSP into boiler systems and use the boiler as It has to be engineered well. We do exactly this together
backup?
with Viessmann and DLR.

No significant problems which I can see.

How does dust negatively mirrors?

Reduces reflectivity, especially specular reflectivity

There can also be abrasion at high wind speeds. The plant in El Tesoro (CSP,
with mirrors) has aluminum reflectors. So the experience there will be useful.

the investment may be lower for Freiburg than for Tanger, but does that include
the costs of maintenance and cleaning?

The costs for cleaning will not have such a strong

impact, but you're right.

what happens if the temps provided go past the Codelco limits (51C)?

... other collector types ... T > 120C concentrating collectors

what is th expected life (in years) of these thermal solar panels?

20+ years

to Ian :could you explain your dust cleaning concept?

Automatic cleaning system: a small battery powered vehicle running of the mirrors
and cleaning them with a rotating brush and some water

what are the cleaning time and cost per sqm?

Depends strongly on soling rate, i.e. how often the mirrors have to cleaned

What about maintenance aspects for mirrors and moving parts? Please provide
some information.

The bearings of the mirrors are maintenance free, the belts of the mirrors drives
have a lifetime of 10+ years. So far, we did not have any broken belt since 2007.

what are the technical difficulties you had when integrating your system into
existing steam networks?

The technical issues can all be solved, but if we are integrating a solar system into
an existing fossil fired steam system, the provider of the fossil fired steam system
might withdraw its waranty

What are the reasons for limiting the Fresnel modules to 24 serial connected?

Thermal expansion of this linear construction. Currently we don't see aneed for
longer collector strings as larger fields typically consist of several strings in parallel.

What is the most Difficult issue facing the solar Industry?

This was discussed at the end of the webinar.

what about the costs of maintenance (dust cleaning, grid, tubes, oil ...)?

Typical numbers for operation and maintenance costs are in the range of 1 to 3%
of the investment per year

Pampa Elvira Solar gets penalized.

What copper extration increase in % through the use of additional thermal energy
is expected?

At least 5% for a 20C increase in leaching fluid temperature. That's what the
literature says, but it has to be proven in large systems.

Hello, in the slide showing the swirls and dust over the collectors, what are those
sticks for?

Changing the tilt of the collectors from season to season to improve collection
efficiency.

can u ellaborate on the techniques involved in electrowinning with solar?

Electrowinning is done at 65C. Much of the heat is generated by the Joule

effect in the electrowinning cells. But the solution coming into the cell must do
so at 55C (Ian showed the exact temperature range) otherwise the quality of
the cathode is affected. It's not a great amount of heat (considering the total
heat flow) since there are recovery heat exchangers that get heat out from the
depleted solution. But it's very critical to the process. So the plant operator
needs total certainty that the process range be kept within strict limits.

Seems like a very dusty environment for the mining fields - does this become
problematic with cleaning, given the scarcity of water?

From other projects that are in operation, it's not a significant problem with flat
plate collectors (the same goes for evacuated tubes)

Medium to High Temperature Solar Heat for Industrial Processes

Questions and Answers

ISES Webinar

Webinar Questions
how do the CSP and other thermal plants deal with the corrosion from the acids,
sands and saline environments?

In case of an earthquake, what would happen with the sunmark concrete

supports? will they move?
what are the latitude and longitude coordinates of the thermal plant.

what other applications over 100C are there in the mining industry?

What is the production costs of the thermal MWh cost in US cents and what is
codelco paying per MWh?
How often the tilt angle is adjusted within one year?
In case of an earthquake, what would happen with the sunmark concrete
supports? will they move?

Q to Roberto Roman How does the solar cogeneration solve the water scarcity
problem? could you please comment on that?

The installed capacity in Chile is 4000 MW. The peak is about 2000 MW. How doe
they plan to accommodate 3500 MWp of solar in the Chilean NIS.

Are there trained people in the mines who can maintain and repair the thermal
plant? What are the main problems they face and what kind of taining(s) have the
gone through?

because of the acid enviroment have you analyzed polypropilene collectors as an

option for low temperature (40-45C)?

As of which capacity are CSP systems cost competetive?

How solar collectors works in mining industry

Responses during webinar

Replies from Christian Zahler

31 January 2014

Repies from Roberto Roman

Good and proven materials. And the plants in operation are providing
excellent learning tools.
Good question. Depends on the type of earthquake and how long it lasts. But
from personal experience (I've lived through many earthquakes) this should
be a problem only with the strongest ones. And those come every couple of
decades.
Here are the approximate coordinates from Google Earth: 23 26.899'S; 68
49.106'W. The photo in Google earth is outdated though.
Here in Chile, not many. The nitrate industry needs to dry and melt nitrate
salts. For this it needs temperatures around 300C. The copper smelting
industry uses processes that are exothermic, so you only need fuel in the
startup of the process (which can run for months).
I guess this is propietary information between CODELCO and Pampa Elvira
Solar. But anyhow the price that was fixed was lower than the equivalent
energy from diesel and it will rise slower as time goes by.
Ian has to answer this one. But I would expect not more than 3 or 4 times a
year: one tilt for summer, one near the equinoxes and one for winter.
See answer below (Answer no. 20)
Since water (acid solutions) are already used for the leaching processes, then
you simply cool the condensing block of your CSP system with these fluids
(that already exist). So no more pressure is put on finding new water supplies.
The gains are double: increase in the CSP efficiency of around 7 to 10% and
increased production from the leaching process. Thus the CSP developer
would sell his rejected heat at a very attractive price to the mine (remember
that heat from diesel works out to about US$100/MWh thermal) and the mine
would get better production.
That's for the Northern Interconnected Grid. But there is no way they can do
this. The excessive number of projects is due to the poor way new generating
projects are managed. More than a rational expansion of the system, it really
works out as a big poker game where the players outbluff each other and try
to get firm power purchase agreements. To fully explain this would require
another Webinar!
There are trained people. However the best business model is that the mines
buy energy (thermal or electrical) and that an external operator provides and
mantains the whole solar system. Thus the mine remains in its core business
and so does the operator. Besides, the rate of return on investment on Mining
projects is usually way higher than solar energy projects.
There's very much UV in the atmosphere, so stability is an issue. Also, as Ian
explained, the thermal system is linked to the conventional heaters in a very
direct and non-intrusive way. And, very important, storage is an essential
point if one wants a high solar fraction. Thermal demand varies greatly
between day and night and also according to production schedules and
seasons. So one needs the highest capacity storage one can envision, and
this means large thermal amplitude.
This is a hard question to answer, since it depends of many factors. However
simulations we've done using the System Advisor Model (SAM) from NREL
show that for electrical power generation, CSP projects should be competitive
to LNG or diesel fired plants for power above 20 MW. In Chile the cost of the
MWh is around US$120.
Very well. There is a system that provides hot water (40 m3/day) that has
been in operation for over 30 years. Collectors had to be changed after 15
years because the original system was direct and there was corrosion in the
collectors. The Pampa Elvira project uses indirect heating.

Medium to High Temperature Solar Heat for Industrial Processes

Questions and Answers

ISES Webinar

Webinar Questions

Responses during webinar

Replies from Christian Zahler

31 January 2014

Repies from Roberto Roman

Question to both Prof.Roman and Mr Nelson: Prof Nelson did hope to receive a
Fresnel technology based offer for Codelco. Why? What would be Mr Nelson view
on that? I think the question would generate a bit of debate, wouldn't it?

We helped CODELCO in the writing on the call for tenders for the plant for
Minera Gabriela Mistral. I said I had excepted that at least one of the offers
would be with a fresnel system or other CSP technology. In fact Abengoa did
present a system similar to the one they built at Tesoro, but there were no
fresnel bids. I suppose because they didn't find suitable partners in Chile
and/or the makers of the technology didn't have enough data to go for this
bid. From a strictly technological viewpoint, fresnel has advantages for this
application. But perhaps the conditions aren't right just now.

our company is GTSS (German Technology Solar System ) Egypt Location, my

question is < if we will use CSP to generate power electricity to drive VRV Chiller is
it will be better C.O.P than lower C.O.P absorbtion chiller

Yes, certainly That's why for cooling most systems worldwide use PV coupled
to electrically operated compression chillers. According to IEA data, the
difference is more than 10:1

Is Solar pond fisible there??

Yes, certainly. But solar ponds still have problems as regards long term
stability. The great thing about them is that storage is already built in.