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Using an excisting power plant to store heat. Source: DLR.

Thermal storage power plants are thermal power plants equipped with a large thermal energy storage that can be heated electrically. They can be charged by electricity from renewable sources and thus provide renewable energy "base load capable". Ideally, thermal storage power plants are used in combination with heat sinks, so that the heat released by the cycle can also be used and a high degree of utilization of the overall process is possible. Both existing power plants (e.g. fired with coal, gas, biomass) can be converted (so-called REPURPOSING) and new plants can be built in connection with the expansion of renewable energies. The users of the technology are large power plant operators, municipal utilities as well as industrial processes with electricity and heat demand in Germany, Europe and worldwide.

Advantages

• Already today, thermal storage power plants are a technologically available option for large storage depths in the range of several GWh,
• due to the possibility to use existing infrastructure, thermal storage power plants contribute significantly to the acceleration of renewable energy expansion scenarios, 
• German industry has a strong technological presence in the various thermal storage power plantstechnologies,
• the expansion targets for renewable energy (and the resulting storage requirements) are so challenging that they can only be realistically achieved by using all technical options, including thermal storage power plants, in parallel.

Goal

To advance the development and implementation of concepts to cover the residual load with CO2 neutral energy through the use of thermal storage technologies in an international context and the implementation of thermal storage in the context of VAC. The tasks involved are:

• Scenario-related consulting on VAC with industry, the energy sector, funding institutions and political bodies
• Initiation of demo plants for the purpose of decarbonization of the global energy system and development of concrete project proposals of VAC with the involvement of other departments, institutes and external partners
• Identify opportunities to leverage existing infrastructure 
• Development of tools for site assessment, technology-neutral independent investigation of economic boundary conditions
• Modeling, evaluation and identification of transformation paths of the energy industry with VACs 
• Investigation of further additional benefits to the arbitrage model such as grid flexibility, control energy, direct marketing
• Formation of a network in the field of "repurposing" of conventional power plants