Concentrating Solar Power and Overview of Sandia National Laboratories

This presentation is to educate residents, students, faculty and community members on Concentrating solar power (CSP). An overview of Sandia National Laboratories and career opportunities will also be presented.
CSP uses a large array of mirrors to focus sunlight onto a receiver containing a heat-transfer fluid, which absorbs the high heat flux (~100 – 1000 times the sun's irradiance). A heat engine (e.g., Rankine cycle, Stirling cycle) then converts the heat to mechanical work to generate electricity. CSP systems can produce utility-scale power (hundreds of megawatts) and can store excess thermal energy for energy production at night or when the sun is not shining. The ability to store large amounts of energy cheaply and reliably gives CSP a significant advantage over other intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and photovoltaics. This presentation will provide an overview of CSP and the primary technologies that are used to implement it: parabolic troughs, power towers, and dish engines. Areas of needed research to improve the performance and economics of CSP technologies will be discussed.