The FY23 Solar-thermal Fuels and Thermal Energy Storage Via Concentrated Solar-thermal (CST) Energy funding program awards $33 million for research, development, and demonstration projects produce fuels leveraging the heat from CST and develop low-cost thermal energy storage systems for dispatchable electricity production and continuous use in specified industrial facilities. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO) announced the funding opportunity on September 21, 2023 and announced the selections on July 25, 2024.
Approach
This funding program is SETO’s first major effort to integrate green concentrating solar-thermal systems with fuel production processes. The program also focuses on the development of long-duration energy storage readily integrated with concentrating solar-thermal technologies for both electricity production and process heat application. Learn more about the use of solar-thermal power in industrial processes.
This investment supports the goals of four DOE Energy Earthshots: Industrial Heat Shot, Long Duration Shot, Hydrogen Shot, and Clean Fuels and Products Shot, all of which aim to rapidly advance solutions to achieve DOE’s decarbonization goals.
Objectives
Selected projects help deliver an equitable clean energy future by advancing the goals of a carbon pollution-free electricity sector by 2035 and achieving net-zero emissions, economy-wide, by 2050.
Selectees
– Award and cost share amounts are rounded and subject to change pending negotiations –
Topic Area 1: Solar-Thermal Fuel Production
Exergy Labs
Project Name: Concentrated Solar-Thermal Modular Pyrolysis Reactor for Jade Hydrogen Production
Location: Dover, DE
DOE Award Amount: $3 million
Awardee Cost Share: $750,000
Principal Investigator: Andrew Muto
Project Description: This project is developing a modular dish reactor for the generation of clean hydrogen with lower cost, carbon intensity, and land-use than other modes of hydrogen production. A high flux/temperature modular receiver reactor is being constructed from high temperature ceramics, creating compact components that limit thermal insulation loss. The team will test prototype dish reactors on-site in North Carolina and Arizona.
National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Project Name: Solar-driven Chemical Looping Reverse Water Gas Shift Regenerative Reactor for Syngas Production (REGENLOOP)
Location: Golden, CO
DOE Award Amount: $3 million
Awardee Cost Share: $800,000
Principal Investigator: Alon Lidor
Project Description: This project is developing a novel CST-compatible reactor that will produce syngas – a mixture of hydrogen and carbon monoxide – via a chemical looping reverse water-gas shift reaction. The syngas can be converted into high-value products such as jet fuel. The team will study new oxide materials, demonstrate the process by designing and testing a lab-scale prototype, and evaluate its commercial viability by designing a 1-megawatt pilot plant and performing a technoeconomic analysis.
West Virginia University
Project Name: Solar Hydrogen Production Using Sustainable Thermal Energy and Reversible Electrolysis (Solar Hydrogen STARs)
Location: Morgantown, WV
DOE Award Amount: $5 million
Awardee Cost Share: $1.2 million
Principal Investigator: Xueyan Song
Project Description: Researchers, in partnership with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, aim to demonstrate the advantages of direct solar-thermal integration with hydrogen production via a high-temperature solid oxide electrolyzer, with the goal of transferring the technology to a wide variety of applications, including creating hydrogen and oxygen.
Topic Area 2: Concentrating Solar-Thermal Energy Storage
Brayton Energy
Project Name: Thermal Energy Storage and Heat Exchange with Integrated Rotating Media Transport
Location: Hampton, NH
DOE Award Amount: $5 million
Awardee Cost Share: $1.25 million
Principal Investigator: Shaun Sullivan
Project Description: This project aims to de-risk a novel, high-temperature, particle-based, thermal energy storage concept to reach a deployable pilot-scale system within three years. The proposed solution simplifies the state-of-the-art technology and reduces required operating power by integrating storage, media transport, and heat exchange into a single vessel. The proposal to build a large rotating drum with particle movement restricted to the circumference allows the integration of transport and storage.
Durion
Project Name: Low-Cost Pressurized Water Storage for CSP Applications
Location: White River Junction, VT
DOE Award Amount: $1.6 million
Awardee Cost Share:$700,000
Principal Investigator: Troy McBride
Project Description: This project aims to advance a patented thermal energy storage system, developed recently through previous DOE funding, which stores energy in the form of pressurized hot water. The technology aims to provide a low-cost solution to provide 1 megawatt of thermal heat for up to 12 hours for commercial and industrial uses.
Firestone Walker Incorporated
Project Name: Concentrated Solar-Thermal Heat Energy and Steam Storage System for Net-Zero Brewing Operations
Location: Paso Robles, CA
DOE Awardee Share: $7.3 million
Awardee Cost Share: $8.2 million
Principal Investigator: Mark Fischer
Project Description: This project aims to generate steam for Firestone Walker Brewery using concentrating solar-thermal energy, eliminating 3,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions from their brewing each year. The team plans to process the 250°C steam at the outlet of the solar field and supply heat directly to the process and the steam accumulator storage tank (in case of excess energy availability).
Premier Resource Management
Project Name: Daily and Seasonal Storage for CST using Geological Thermal Energy Storage: Pilot Plant and Techno-Economic Analysis
Location: Bakersfield, CA
DOE Award Amount: $6 million
Awardee Cost Share: $12.5 million
Principal Investigator: Jim Lederhos
Project Description: This project is developing a 100-kilowatt electric demonstration power plant with more than 12 hours of storage, which stores thermal heat underground at depleted oil reservoirs in California. The technology can enable seasonal energy storage heated by CST to firm the electricity grid when intermittent renewables are unavailable for extended periods of time.
SWRI
Project Name: Actively Managed Dual Media Thermal Energy Storage for Low-Cost Solar Thermal
Location: San Antonio, TX
DOE Award Amount: $1.2 million
Awardee Cost Share: $300,000
Principal Investigator: Joshua Schmitt
Project Description: This project aims to test an advanced dual media energy storage system that uses liquid molten salt and solid storage to provide 1 megawatt thermal heat for 10 hours to a supercritical carbon dioxide system through a heat exchanger. The test should demonstrate the impact of low-cost concentrated solar-thermal in utility power applications, meeting DOE targets for reducing the price of renewable energy.
University of Tennessee
Project Name: High Performance Cascaded Additively Manufactured Heat Exchangers for Clean and Low-cost Power Generation and Industrial Process Heating
Location: Knoxville, TN
DOE Award Amount: $850,000
Awardee Cost Share: $200,000
Principal Investigator: Prashant Singh
Project Description: This project is developing a high-performance cascaded heat exchanger concept for low-cost power generation and the production of high-temperature industrial process heat. The team will design the cascaded heat exchanger based on a flowing particle system serving as both heat transfer fluid and thermal energy storage media.
Learn more about SETO’s Concentrating Solar-Thermal Power (CSP) research and CSP’s use in industrial processes.