The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has determined that solar power coupled desalination could be the next step in helping to resolve the water-energy nexus. For many decades, integration of concentrating solar power (CSP) electricity generation for combined power and water production has typically utilized the conventional method of steam Rankine cycles. Current research focuses on an enticing innovative method which combines CSP with Brayton cycles and uses supercritical CO2 (sCO2) as a working fluid, allowing for a broader temperature range. This techno-economic study analyzes the power and possible freshwater generation of each cycle and provides a comparison of the techno-economic advantages associated with each technology when applied to desalination processes. The results of this study suggest that recompression-closed Brayton (RCBR) cycle is likely to have the most significant impact in decreasing the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), almost halving it from combining CSP with the traditional Rankine cycle. Also, to minimize levelized cost of water (LCOW) a smaller scale desalination facility which utilizes multi-effect distillation with thermal vapor compression (MED/TVC) instead of multi-stage flash distillation (MSF) is most applicable. Although the lowest LCOE values are for wet-cooled RCBR with MSF and MED/TVC, in areas where freshwater generation is crucial to be optimized there is only a 0.04 cents/kWh increase for dry-cooled RCBR with MED/TVC to a cost of 9.8 cents/kWh. This suggests the best candidate for optimizing freshwater generation while minimizing both LCOW and LCOE is dry-cooled RCBR with MED/TVC desalination.
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ASME 2018 Power Conference collocated with the ASME 2018 12th International Conference on Energy Sustainability and the ASME 2018 Nuclear Forum
June 24–28, 2018
Lake Buena Vista, Florida, USA
Conference Sponsors:
- Power Division
- Advanced Energy Systems Division
- Solar Energy Division
- Nuclear Engineering Division
ISBN:
978-0-7918-5140-1
PROCEEDINGS PAPER
Techno-Economic Comparison Between Conventional and Innovative Combined Solar Thermal Power and Desalination Methods for Cogeneration Available to Purchase
Megan W. Haynes,
Megan W. Haynes
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
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Andrey Gunawan,
Andrey Gunawan
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
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Shannon K. Yee
Shannon K. Yee
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
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Megan W. Haynes
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Andrey Gunawan
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Shannon K. Yee
Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Paper No:
POWER2018-7515, V002T12A013; 8 pages
Published Online:
October 4, 2018
Citation
Haynes, MW, Gunawan, A, & Yee, SK. "Techno-Economic Comparison Between Conventional and Innovative Combined Solar Thermal Power and Desalination Methods for Cogeneration." Proceedings of the ASME 2018 Power Conference collocated with the ASME 2018 12th International Conference on Energy Sustainability and the ASME 2018 Nuclear Forum. Volume 2: Heat Exchanger Technologies; Plant Performance; Thermal Hydraulics and Computational Fluid Dynamics; Water Management for Power Systems; Student Competition. Lake Buena Vista, Florida, USA. June 24–28, 2018. V002T12A013. ASME. https://doi.org/10.1115/POWER2018-7515
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