Sensible Heat Storage for Power Generation

The world is seeing a changing trend from conventional power generation sources to most reliable and predominant solar system generation which is going wild commercially. This paper attempts a heat energy storage for power generation in which a Molten Salt is proposed for Thermal Energy Storage for Concentrating Solar Power systems. In the concept numerous large, flat, sun-tracking mirrors, known as heliostats are used which focuses sunlight onto a receiver at the top of a tall tower. A heat-transfer fluid heated in the receiver is used to generate steam, which, in turn, is used in a conventional turbine generator to produce electricity. Some power towers use water/steam as the heat-transfer fluid. Other advanced designs are experimenting with molten nitrate salt because of its superior heat-transfer and energy-storage capabilities. Individual commercial plants can be sized to produce more than 200 megawatts of electricity. Solar power tower convert sunshine into clean electricity. The technology uses many large, sun-tracking mirrors commonly referred as heliostats to focus sunlight on a receiver at the top of a tower. The enormous amount of energy, coming out of the sun rays, concentrated at one point (the tower in the middle), produces temperatures of approximately 550°C to 1500°C. The gained thermal energy can be used for molten salt, which saves the energy for later use.