Student research opportunities
An annual performance model for dish/Rankine/storage systems using ASCEND.
Project Code: CECS_745
This project is available at the following levels:
Engn4200, Engn R&D, Summer Scholar
Please note that this project is only for undergraduate students.
Keywords:
solar thermal energy, thermodynamics, modeling, simulation, energy, storage.
Supervisor:
Dr John PyeOutline:
The ANU SG4 Big Dish is a solar thermal energy generator aimed for large-scale use in big solar power stations.
In this project, some existing modelling software, ASCEND, will be used to generate an annual performance model of a complete solar power station based on the Big Dish technology.
Part of the challenge here is in understanding all the components and how they should be put together, but another major part of the project is in extending ASCEND where necessary so that the task can be completed. This will especially require attention if modelling a dynamic (DAE/ODE) system with thermal energy storage or thermal inertia.
Although other (commercial) modelling tools exist that are able to perform this calculation (such as SAM, TRNSYS, IPSEpro, Thermoflex, etc etc), these tools are very to extremely expensive, and often out of reach of students and small R&D groups. Part of the aim of this project is to make better modelling tools available for free for these groups, and to make energy system modelling something to which more engineers have direct access.
Goals of this project
Part-load performance model for a steam turbine.
Dish concentrator component model. Validate against recent experimental data from Solar Thermal Group.
Sun position plus weather models: extend and integrate if required.
Annual simulation, without storage. Some basic levelised energy cost calculation follows easily from that.
Thermal energy storage design and modelling.
Review previous work with ASCEND and ODE/DAE systems, in particular with 'boundary switching' and complete/extend if required.
Annual simulation, with storage, using an ODE/DAE solver if deemed suitable/sufficient.
Requirements/Prerequisites
Distinction or better results in ENGN2222 and ENGN3224 thermodynamics subjects (or equivalent).
Strong computer skills, including C, C++ or Java (or similar)
