Fluidized Bed Particle Heat Exchanger for Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Power Cycles

Numerous studies in the field of power generation deal with efficiency and flexibility enhancement of power plants. Supercritical carbon dioxide (sCO₂) power cycles promise significantly higher efficiencies and very compact constructions compared to conventional Rankine cycles. An opportunity to increase the flexibility of such power cycles, is the integration of Thermal Energy Storage (TES) systems into the process. In this work the sandTES technology, a particle based TES system is introduced, which can be used to improve the load change characteristics of power plants even at highest temperatures. After introducing the main concept and the key technologies of the sandTES technology, a utility scale heat exchanger for implementation in a high temperature sCO₂ power cycle is presented and discussed. Finally crucial design parameters of the presented heat exchanger (HEX) are outlined as well as their influences on the HEX dimensions are discussed.