The molten salt mixture deployed in today’s commercial CSP plants for thermal energy storage is liquid at 565°C and degrades at higher temperatures. Yet higher temperatures would increase thermal efficiency. So how can we develop a molten salt mix that can reach temperatures up to 620°C without degradation? And at [...]
An assessment of the cost/benefit of each green heat technology is timely, as countries that were most heavily dependent on Russian gas must rapidly decarbonize heavy industry as gas supplies dwindle from over 40% to under 10% and rise in price from 20 to 140 euros per MWh. Gas imports [...]
Solar thermal power plants use concentrated sunlight to first generate heat and then electricity. They are already in use today in particularly sunny regions, such as Spain, the USA or Chile. To further advance this technology and make it more competitive, the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum fuer Luft- und [...]
A new approach to sector coupling: German Aerospace Center (DLR) conducts research on a new kind of concentrated solar power plan. In the PEGASUS research project, the German Aerospace Center’s Institute of Solar Research in Jülich is studying a completely new kind of solar thermal power plant which stores solar [...]
Use of solar energy in the calcination process to minimise carbon dioxide emissions during cement production. Rotary kiln successfully tested in the solar simulator at the DLR Institute of Solar Research in Cologne. Can be used in Southern Europe and emerging markets. Solar researchers at the German Aerospace Center [...]
The SolarPACES Technology Award 2018 has gone to the DLR Institute of Solar Research and the DLR start-up CSP Services for QFly, an airborne system for the quality assessment of concentrated solar power plants. Over 500 people attended the annual conference held by the SolarPACES network of researchers in Casablanca [...]
On 28 November 2017, the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR), together with international project partners, presented what is currently the largest solar-chemical installation for the production of hydrogen. In the HYDROSOL_Plant project, scientists and companies have jointly further developed the process of direct hydrogen production using [...]
Germany's DLR research center has opened a new test facility which should help to reduce the cost of molten salt storage by "up to 40%," DLR said in a statement September 15. The Test Facility for Thermal Energy Storage in Molten Salt (TESIS) will be used to test molten salt [...]
One hundred tons of molten salt circulate through the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) test facility in Cologne. The molten salt is alternately heated and cooled from 250 to 560 degrees Celsius. Opened on 15 September 2017, the Test Facility for Thermal Energy Storage [...]
For years now, scientists from the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) have conducted research at the Plataforma Solar de Almería (PSA) in the south of Spain, which is operated by partner organisation CIEMAT (Centre for Energy, Environment and Technology). At this location scientists are [...]
To know the solar radiation of the next fifteen minutes is one of the objectives of the working group solar energy meteorology in DLR’s Institute of Solar Research. In cooperation with the companies CSP Services GmbH and TSK Flagsol Engineering GmbH, the scientists have developed the new nowcasting system WOBAS, [...]
Scientists from DLR have, together with partners, compiled a guide to calculate the yield from a solar power plant before operations have started. The project financing of solar power plants should be easier with the guide and their competitiveness consequently given a boost. Scientists from the German Aerospace Center [...]
How will the technologies for the production of electricity from solar energy develop in the coming decades? Which technology is the most economical? What opportunities do the combination of multiple systems offer? A study conducted under the leadership of the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) [...]
