Project Name: 740H Diffusion Bonded Compact Heat Exchanger for High Temperature and Pressure Applications
Funding Opportunity: Solar Energy Technologies Office Fiscal Year 2018 Funding Program (SETO FY2018)
SETO Team: Concentrating Solar Power
Location: De Pere, WI
SETO Award Amount: $1,240,000
Awardee Cost Share: $320,000
Planned Timeline: 2019-2021
-- Award and cost share amounts are subject to change pending negotiations --
This project team is developing new manufacturing techniques for an advanced alloy, Inconel 740H, which has extremely high strength at the temperatures required for next-generation concentrating solar-thermal power (CSP) plants. Using proprietary designs developed by Comprex, heat exchangers made from 740H are promising for higher temperature CSP plants, particularly to deliver heat to power cycles that use supercritical carbon dioxide (sCO2). If successful, this project will enable CSP plants to operate at higher efficiencies.
APPROACH
The project team, in collaboration with Special Metals, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Advanced Vacuum Systems, is developing manufacturing processes using iterative testing of different approaches to address challenges involved in using 740H in heat exchangers for CSP plants. It will then produce and test a prototype using industry-standard manufacturing techniques, which will operate at a 100-kilowatt scale.
INNOVATION
This project will produce a heat exchanger that can withstand higher temperatures and salt corrosion in CSP plants and is ideal for use with sCO2 cycles. This design will address the challenges that the material poses in etching and diffusion bonding that prevent the cost-effective manufacturing of 740H heat exchangers.