Methodology for sizing the solar field for parabolic trough technology with thermal storage and hybridization

Jodhpur, in India, was considered as a location for the case study and the results are presented to understand the influence of thermal storage and hybridization for a given capacity of the plant. The results for various combinations of thermal storage hours and fraction of hybridization used with respect to plant capacity, solar multiple, annual plant efficiency etc. have been discussed in detail. It is observed from the results that, under design conditions, the reference aperture area per MW decreases as plant capacity increases and reaches a limiting value asymptotically at a capacity of 50 MW. The optimized size of the solar field, with respect to annual efficiency, is found to be 1.4 and 2.3 times the size under design conditions for zero and six hours thermal storage respectively. The benefit of hybridization is high for lower solar multiples.