Prof. Eduardo Zarza, the Head of the PSA R+D Unit (Plataforma Solar de Almería), Spain
Prof. Eduardo Zarza, the Head of the PSA R+D Unit (Plataforma Solar de Almeria), Spain
Solar energy, together with wind energy, are the renewable energies with the highest potential to significantly contribute to a cleaner energy market. There are many Countries with a high solar radiation resource and Morocco is one of these Countries. Solar radiation can be converted into thermal energy at high temperatures if it is previously concentrated. Once the direct solar radiation is concentrated and converted into thermal energy, such thermal energy can be used to feed either industrial processes requiring thermal energy (e.g., food industries, chemical industries, etc..) or thermodynamic cycles (e.g., Rankine, Brayton or Stirling) to produce electricity. Solar systems that produce electricity using concentrated solar radiation are called Solar Thermal Power Plants. At present there are four technologies for solar radiation concentration and, therefore, for solar thermal power plants: parabolic-trough collectors (PTC), central receiver (CR) systems, parabolic dishes (PD) and Linear Fresnel concentrators (LFC). Although solar thermal power plants are experiencing a significant commercial deployment during the last years (there are more than 3,5 GWe currently in operation) there is a large potential for cost reduction because these systems are still at an early stage of their “learning curve”. The only way to develop this large potential for improvement and cost reduction is Research and Development (R&D). Since the list of possible topics for R&D is large, the identification of high priority topics is very important in order to devote more resources to those topics that can have a greater impact on cost reduction and efficiency improvements.
This keynote talk will explain the list of R&D topics related to solar thermal power plants and it will identify those topics that should be given higher priority.
Biography
Dr Eduardo Zarza was born in 1958 in Huelva (Spain). He got his Master degree in Industrial Engineering in 1986 and his Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from University of Seville (Spain) in 2003.
At present he is working at the Plataforma Solar de Almería (PSA), which is the largest R+D centre in the World devoted to solar concentrating systems. He is the Head of the PSA R+D Unit on Solar Concentrating Systems, composed of 31 scientists and researchers working on industrial applications of concentrated solar radiation, including electricity production, hydrogen production and industrial heat processes in the range from 125ºC to 2000ºC.
He has been working for the last 29 years with solar concentrating systems. He has been the Director of several national and International R+D projects related to solar energy and parabolic trough collectors (the projects DISS, Solar Thermal Desalination, CAPSOL, PREDINCER, DETECSOL, etc..). His specific R+D areas have been: solar seawater desalination, parabolic trough solar collectors and direct steam generation. He has written five books, fifteen chapters of books, 19 articles in peer-reviewed publications and 78 proceedings in International congresses related to solar energy. He has organizad several national and International courses and seminars related to solar energy. He is a peer reviewer of many scientific magazines and Publications (Solar Energy, ASME Journal of Solar Energy Engineering, Applied Thermal Engineering, ENERGY – The International Journal of Chemical Engineering and Processing, and others). He collaborates in many Master courses and Seminars devoted to renewable energies and efficiency. He is a member of: the Spanish AENOR and IEC standardization committees for solar thermal power plants, the Scientific and Technical Committee of the European Association of Solar Thermal Electricity (ESTELA), the Scientific Committee of CIC-Energigune and the Executive Committee of SolarPACES (an implementing agreement of the International Energy Agency, IEA). He has participated in the definition of the Strategic Research Agendas of several international entities, like ESTELA and KIC-Innoenergy.