Fuel Flexibility in Compressed Air Energy Storage Plants

Abstract

The pneumatic storage of energy is one of the few economical storage processes which can be considered at present for large quantities of energy. Present Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) plants are designed on the basis of construction and operating experience at Huntorf, the world's first air-storage plant [1]. That means, that the turbine of the plant is equipped with combustors to increase the power output during turbine operation, and to reduce the volume and cost of the air storage facility as well as the quantity and cost of the required charging energy [2]. In this paper it is explained that the Brown Boveri CAES turbomachinery is able to burn a variety of different fuels. This opens in many cases the possibility to choose a cheaper or better available fuel to reduce furthermore the operating cost of this kind of pov1er plant.