Simulation of Operational Management for the Solar Thermal Test and Demonstration Power Plant Jülich Using Optimized Control Strategies of the Storage System

Electricity production costs and overall net efficiency of the system are determining factors regarding the quality and cost effectiveness of a solar tower power plant. These factors are strongly dependent on the quality of heliostats, the receiver and the thermal storage concept. This work describes the optimization of load states of a storage system through applying internal process control strategies for the air circuit of the Solar Tower Jülich which works with open volumetric air receiver technology. A concept for optimal operation of the thermal storage system was formulated and developed. Storage concepts include both technical adjustments of the existing storage system as well as the control process of the thermal storage. For simulating the optimized operating strategy of the power plant systems all main power plant components were modeled in MATLAB®/Simulink® and interconnected to form a complete system. The focus of the simulation lies in optimizing the operating strategy of a discretized thermal energy storage model.