247Solar's concentrated solar plant doubles as its own fossil-fuel backup
Turning a solar power system into its own backup
Concentrated solar has lost the cost race to photovoltaics, but 247Solar is betting on a different angle: its plant stores heat in ceramic pellets for overnight generation, and the same turbine hardware can burn fossil fuels when the sun doesn't deliver. India has contracted a 1 MW pilot, with a 3 MW modular design in the works. The company sees remote mining sites—where diesel is costly to ship—as a prime market.
The heat exchanger does the same job as the combustor did. It's in the same place in the turbine assembly as the combustor was: after the compression stage and before the expander.
- bob1029
We can break the 5500K temperature limit with passive elements and some clever engineering.
- michaelscott
Maybe I missed it somewhere in the write up but in what way is the solar system its own backup? It seemed like the battery was just subbed for a combustion system using stored heat?
- ulkhf
How is this different from Ivanpah?