High Temperature Thermal Energy Storage for Solar Cooling Applications
Abstract
The final goal of this study is to develop a robust, compact, and efficient high temperature thermal energy storage (TES) system for solar cooling applications. A pilot plant was designed and constructed at the University of Lleida with enough flexibility to test different types of TES systems and different temperature ranges from 150 to 400 ºC. This pilot plant is already operative and has a thermal oil heater of 22 kW of power, an air heat exchanger of 20 kW, and a TES tank. All of these devices were designed by the University of Lleida, as well as all the heat transfer fluid (HTF) circuit, including valves, pipes and connections. This work is focused in the selection of the storage material, and design and construction of the storage tank.