Technico-economic comparison of heat transfer fluids or thermal energy storage materials: a case study using Jatropha curcas oil
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Date
2021-01
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
African Journal of Science Technology Innovation and Development 13(5):1-19
Abstract
Thermal oils are omnipresent in processes using heat at high temperature as heat transfer
fluids (HTF) as well as thermal storage materials (TESM), particularly in concentrating solar
plants. In this study, a methodology for technico-economic comparison of HTF and TESM is
proposed. Jatropha curcas crude oil (JaCCO), a non-edible vegetable oil, which has recently
been proposed as an alternative to well-established heat transfer fluids (HTFs), is compared to
some of these HTFs from an economic point of view. Two case studies were considered for
the assessment, using the features of a pilot μ-CSP plant: i) the oils are used only as a HTF or
ii) they are used as a HTF and a TESM. The degradation rate of the oils was considered as a
parameter. The results show that from a technical point of view, the oils exhibit similar
performance. The economic analysis was mainly impacted by the cost of oil per kWh of
stored energy. For the plant using the oils as HTFs only, JaCCO would always be
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economically more attractive than the other oils if its replacement frequency is less than 8–25
times that of the other oils in the economic conditions assumed in this study
Description
Keywords
heat transfer fluids, Jatropha curcas crude oil, solar concentrating power, technico-economic analysis, thermal storage, Yézouma Coulibaly, Engineering, Institut International d'Ingénierie de l'Eau et de l'Environnement (2iE), Burkina Faso, 2iE College of Engineering