Expanding the Western U.S. Grid With CSP

As states within the United States respond to future grid development goals, there is a growing demand for reliable and resilient nighttime generation that can be addressed by low-cost, long-duration energy storage solutions. This paper summarizes the findings of a study for the state of California that evaluated how molten-salt tower concentrating solar power (CSP) plants with thermal energy storage (TES) can be utilized to address the goals within the state established by Senate Bill 100. The study found that CSP exhibits deployment potential both in California and in the rest of the Western Interconnection and is utilized primarily to serve nighttime load. The plants are designed to collect and store energy during the day and then are dispatched to produce power at night. The paper presents a technoeconomic analysis that compares the cost of CSP to photovoltaics (PV) plus battery energy storage systems (BESS), provides an overview of capacity expansion modeling performed by NREL, and a screening analysis that identifies CSP siting potential in the U.S.