Performance analysis and economic evaluation of a solar power tower in Algeria

In the context of the deployment and implementation of grid connected concentrated solar power plants which are in still progress in MENA regions, the different authority of this country like Algeria gives suitable environment for the promotion and the diversification of energy sources to produce electricity. The energy policy and legal framework are the main incentive trials to support that future environmental friendly assignment, thus in this work, a thermal performance analysis coupled to economic reliability were elaborated using SAM advisor software as a preliminary results in order to investigate whether the installation of high concentrated central receiver solar power plant in different regions (coastal, highland and Sahara) is feasible. We have carried out a method to optimize the Solar Multiple (SM) to get a trade-off between the incremental investment cost related to the heliostat field size and the Thermal Energy Storage (TES) required, yielding a minimum Levelized Electricity Cost (LEC) in DZA/kWhe and allow higher Capacity Factors (CF) for dispatchability of the generated electricity within critical hours in the day. This study presents also the optimization process to build some design parameter like receiver working temperature with molten salt as Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF) medium and thus perform the allowable flux density admitted by the receiver cavity from a given size of heliostat field. Finally, the electricity unit cost, the Net Present Value (NPV) and the internal rate of return variants depending on the region are calculated. The results indicate that for optimal working parameters and a given size of the solar field, highland and Sahara regions are the suitable regions for grid integration and and economic competitiveness of the central receiver power tower plant.