The increasing share of fluctuating renewables in the energy mix is putting pressure on conventional power plants to increase their operating flexibility. A major challenge in this context is reducing the minimum load of coal-fired plants. In addition to improved burner design and optimized control strategies, integration of a thermal storage system could enable a reduction of the minimum load to virtually 0%. This, while keeping the boiler in operation allowing for rapid ramp-up of the power output when needed. Based on process simulations in EBSILON Professional, this paper assesses the potential and challenges related to the integration of a molten salt storage system in a 550 MWel coal-fired plant. Several storage integration strategies have been considered, resulting in overall round-trip efficiencies between 60 and 65.5%. The specific costs of the investigated storage system were found to range between 26 and 44 €/kWhth.      «

The increasing share of fluctuating renewables in the energy mix is putting pressure on conventional power plants to increase their operating flexibility. A major challenge in this context is reducing the minimum load of coal-fired plants. In addition to improved burner design and optimized control strategies, integration of a thermal storage system could enable a reduction of the minimum load to virtually 0%. This, while keeping the boiler in operation allowing for rapid ramp-up of the pow...     »