Energy and Exergy Analysis of a Direct Solar Steam Power Plant with Solar Parabolic Concentrator for Yazd City with Several Water Preheaters

In this study, energy and exergy for different parts of a 5 MWe direct steam generation (DSG) solar power plant was analyzed for Yazd city climate. It was observed that the most energy in the condenser and the most exergy losses occurred in the parabolic solar concentrator. To improve the efficiency of the concentrator, this study recommends to preheat the water entering the concentrator with one or more open preheaters in which the extractions of steam from turbine should be optimized by their pressures and mass flow rates. For different cases in which the cycle has up to 4 preheaters, the efficiency of the first and second laws of thermodynamics was investigated. In the case of 4 preheaters, based on obtained results, it was revealed that the efficiency of the first and second laws were 17.2% and 16%, respectively which was a significant increase compared to the case where the cycle had one, two or three preheaters. Therefore, according to the obtained results from the efficiency of the first and second laws as well as the irreversibility of power plant components, the cycle of the present article can be recommended for the city of Yazd.