From 8 to 12 July 2019, CNRS organised the 1st SFERA-III Training for Industries course at PROMES-CNRS premises in Font Romeu Odeillo, France. The objective was to offer a course or engineers, researchers and representatives from European CSP industry and companies with theoretical and practical topics of central receiver systems in general and heliostat field design, operation and measurement in particular. Table 2 shows the program of the course held at the premises of PROMES-CNRS Odeillo.
It welcomed 13 professionals from Spain, Iran, Chile, USA, France, Italy, Algeria and Oman.
The course covered the following topics:
- Central receivers technologies and qualification: Typical thermodynamic processes for electricity and material production; storage technologies for solar tower; metrology of their power measurement; infrared receiver temperature measurement using UAV (drones).
- Heliostats fields design and operation: Heliostat field design optimisation techniques and constraints such as latitude influence; raytracing software and design tools for heliostats fields; training with the free Solstice raytracing software; practical test case: visit of the wireless field of the solar tower Thémis at Targassonne; practical test case: visit of the wired field of the Solar Furnace at Odeillo.
- Characterisation of heliostats fields: Optical quality determination techniques (photogrammetry, deflectometry); demonstration of the optical calibration of solar tower heliostats; power distribution and aiming characterisation techniques.
The training consisted of both theoretical and practical modules, and included facilities’ visits and practical test cases.
The slides shown during the training can be downloaded here.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 823802