Development of supercritical CO2 solar rankine cycle system

Abstract

A supercritical CO2 solar Rankine cycle system, an innovation of a new concept for global warming solution by using CO2 as a natural working fluid is introduced and the development of the novel system is presented. The system consists of solar collectors, power generation turbine, heat exchangers, and mechanical feed pump (or a novel concept the so-called thermally driven pump). This system is particularly characterized by CO2 transcritical Rankine cycle with newly developed system elements, which include evacuated tube solar collector, turbine, gas–liquid heat exchanger, feed pump and other flow regulating elements. In this article much attention is given to the thermally driven pump, which shows promising performance data, when replacing for a mechanical feed pump in the system. Preliminary results gained from a prototype system installed for an actual operation under extracting solar thermal energy, producing electric and heat energy, indicate that the system has more advantages against a fossil fueled cogeneration system. The developed system represents highly potential solution and idea to solve the global warming crisis, and also can give a clue to a path of future energy creation technique for green energy resources.