THE FUTURE OF CONCENTRATED SOLAR POWER PLANTS

The Key Challenges of
Concentrated Solar Power Plants
Solar power offers a global solution
for the shortage of energy sources.
But how can production costs be reduced to a profi table amount?
Solar energy is completely emission-free and inexhaustible.
But how can costs be minimized throughout the entire life cycle of the plant?
Solar energy has an excellent growth potential.
But how can the challenge of fast changes between night and day be faced?
HIGH POTENTIAL FOR TOMORROW’S POWER SUPPLY
In six hours the world’s deserts receive more energy than the
whole mankind consumes in one year. To cover the entire global
demand for electric power of 18,000 TWh per year it would theore
tically be suffi cient to equip three thousandths of the world’s
deserts with collector fi elds for solar thermal power plants. Today,
our experts already work on turning the attractive vision of using
solar energy on a big scale into reality. Solar energy has developed
a rising market tendency. Ideal conditions are mainly found in nine
countries along the world`s sun belt. This belt reaches around the
planet north and south of the equator – mainly through deserts.
Countries like Spain, the United States or China already are using
solar energy for industrial electricity generation.
MEETING CHALLENGES WITH INNOVATION
Storing energy that was generated during the daytime and making
it usable during the nighttime is only one of the challenges for
which our experts are developing concepts today. At the same time
production costs are about three times higher than compared to
conventional power plants. In order to reach a higher share of solar
power on the energy mix in the long run more effi cient technologies
– meaning optimized performance and reduced cost – will be
required. At this point our spx solutions come into play: Through
innovative engineering we can signifi cantly reduce the investment
The Key Challenges of Concentrated Solar Power Plants
costs of a plant. At the same time we reduce a second major cost
factor: maintenance efforts – and implement new low-maintenance
concepts for our customers.
SYSTEM COMPETENCY – THE KEY TO COST-EFFECTIVENESS
The degree of effi ciency and therefore the cost-effectiveness of a
solar power plant is determined by the key components of the system,
two of them being the water-steam and cooling cycles. Here,
the overall performance depends directly on the perfect interaction
of all components. The more we optimize system specifi cations,
the more effi cient will the overall system work. Exactly this
system expertise brings us to the forefront of engineering in the
energy market – worldwide.
WATER – PRESERVING A VALUABLE RESOURCE
With our broad knowledge about thermal power plant systems we
are also solving another problem in solar thermal power generation
– water consumption. Most solar power plants are located in
very arid desert regions. Especially there, water is a very important
and limited resource. For that reason our solar components have
been developed for minimum water consumption.
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