A1 MW National Solar Thermal Research Cum Demonstration Facility at Gwalpahari, Haryana, India

Concentrated solar power (CSP) plants have invited wide attention in various sunlight-rich regions around the world, including India. Under sponsorship of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, Government of India, the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai has conceptualized and carried out the basic engineering design, installation, commissioning and operation of a 1 MW(e) CSP plant in the campus of the National Institute of Solar Energy at Gwalpahari, near Gurgaon, Haryana, India. This is a unique facility integrating two different solar collector fields; direct steam-generating linear Fresnel reflector (LFR) field and conventional heat transfer fluid-based parabolic trough collector (PTC) field. It is a researchcum- demonstration facility intended to enable the development of future cost-effective CSP plants in the country. The design basis, brief description of the power plant, learning experiences during commissioning and operation of the plant, as well as preliminary performance results are presented here. The plant is grid-connected and operational. The preliminary results show low performance due to the lower optical efficiencies of both the collector fields, tracking error, loop imbalance of PTC field, and improper receiver size of LFR field.