The theme of this session of the conference is to promote the industrial development with solar science and technology innovation. I have made some statistics on the papers of the conference, and would like to share some of my results and thoughts with you.
The conference published a total of 51 oral reports, including invited papers, of which 21 from research institutes of central enterprises, accounting for 41%.
In terms of the reports from research institutes, there are many founding units. Xi’an Jiaotong University, Wuhan University of Technology, Institute of Engineering Thermophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Institute of Electrical Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing Industry University, North China Electric Power University have attended ten sessions of the conference. President Yang of North China Electric Power University participated the first session, and his student also made a report just now. President of Wuhan University of Technology,Zhang Qingjie was also invited to come in person.
Papers not including the invited papers are counted as follows:
1.In terms of concentration way: 8 papers on trench type, 14 on tower type, 2 on linear Fresnel type.
2. In terms of the industry chain: 4 papers on materials, 4 on condenser, 7 on thermal absorber, 4 on heat storage, 20 on system integration, 1 on power machine, that is the Stirling machine of Zhejiang University. From the above we can see that there are a lot of papers on system integration, with 20 articles as oral reports.
3. In terms of technical classification
The first generation regards water and oil as the heat transfer medium, 9 papers;
The second generation is molten salt, 19 papers;
The third generation regards air as the medium, 3 papers;
The fourth generation is the grain, and there is no paper show.
From conference reports of Mr. Manuel Blanco and Mr. Piero de Boni from EU at the opening ceremony on the first day, we can see that the EU has spent a lot of money in the fourth generation of technology. Most of our reports focus on the second generation of molten salt.
4. Comparison of the distribution of contributions submitted by enterprises and research institutes.
In terms of materials, 1 paper from enterprises, 3 from research institutions;
In terms of controlling, 2 papers from enterprises, 0 from research institutions;
In terms of equipment, 6 papers from enterprises, 8 from research institutions;
In terms of system integration, 7 papers from enterprises, 6 from research institutions;
In terms of new product development, a total of 5 papers, of which 3 on new equipment, 2 on new software.
Published new products include new hydraulic of Auman new energy, improved vacuum tube from Longteng, Ni-base alloy from Baosteel Special steel. 2 pieces of software from Institute of Electrical Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, one is the tower and trough type simulator, the other is the heliostat field design. Through this data, we can see that the research and development of new products relatively rare. Therefore, in the past 2 years, there were few new products including condenser, thermal absorber and heat storage in our country.
So where did universities and research institutes focus on?
From the statistical figures of the contributions we can see that the research institutes and the universities are basically concentrated on system simulation and analysis.
In terms of system integration, enterprises and universities have equal number of papers. However, the enterprise mainly introduces the operation condition of the current system, while the research institutions focus on computer analog simulation. There are 20 papers on system integration, but only 4 on condenser, 7 on thermal absorber, with a total of 11 papers. 4 papers on heat storage, with a total of 15 papers of all the equipment, which are no more than the contributions on system integration. Because the research institutions are not able to make actual solar energy experimental system, they can only carry out the research with the help of software simulation, but the simulation software not coming from the experiment has little value to the enterprise and industry.
Enterprises themselves have integrated a number of systems, such as the SUPCON, Shouhang, Longteng, Rayspower, China General Nuclear Power Corporation, Lanzhou Dacheng, and so on all have their own pilot-level solar collecting system. In addition to Institute of Electrical Engineering, many research institutions and universities do not have such a comprehensive experimental system, and many people, especially graduate students have not participated in integration, so they can only make integrated simulation research with the computer. Simply simulation of electricity generation on the computer is totally different from the actual electricity generation, even if the research cannot be applied by enterprises.
The theme of this conference is the solar thermal electricity technology. Why did many people attend Hangzhou CSP PLAZA in June this year, which put emphasis on the industrialization? Arguably, we should provide new technology in this conference, especially provide manufacturer enterprises and 20 demonstration project owners with what they are most concerned with. But we do not achieve this seeing from the statistics of the contributions. We are weak in research and development of new equipment. It is very ashamed that I am also engaged in equipment study, but I fail to make any contribution to creating a new heliostat or a new condenser and thermal absorber. Many research institutions do not focus their time and effort on key equipment. Why? If they want to make researchs, where do the funds come from? As the national major research and development special project of renewable energy sources has not yet started, the current R&D CSP funds come from the National Natural Science Foundation of China, which focuses on the mechanism and basic theoretical research, so product R&D funds cannot take this channel. Our original channel is the national 863,973 and support plan, and now the country has unified them as national major R&D plan, but the plan for renewable energy sources has not yet started. So the two roads are blocked. On the surface, this made the researchers have no funding sources for equipment research and development. In fact, there is another important R&D funding channel, that is, combining with the enterprise. This channel can be available round-the-clock, without any constraints. In order to promote the industrialization with technological progress, research institutions and enterprises need to be closely integrated to research and develop new equipment, which can bring significant cost reduction. But we seem to fail to use this channel, and still get used to waiting for national projects. Equipment research should focus on reliability, and then is the cost. Why SUPCON and Shanghai Electric can make successful bidding in many places? Because they have practical experience to prove their reliability.
Looking from the international front and seeing from the front statistics, there are few contributions in the particle thermal absorber and thermal absorber of more than 700 degrees, which cannot keep up with the international pace.
From two foreign keynote reports at the opening in the morning, we can see that Europe and the United States have deployed a lot of money in this area, but our report is 0. The energy of our researchers did not focus on this, which cannot keep up with the international development trend. In the future, we may promote some of the country’s major scientific and technological projects and international cooperation projects in this area to give an important layout, so as to promote sustainable industrialization and to promote the development of industrialization with technological progress.
There are few articles in the field of materials. The progress of materials will bring a revolutionary development for the industry. The development of materials in the field of energy is very important and the technological progress of materials science has promoted the rapid development of photovoltaic industry. But the research time of materials is long. In terms of solar technology, it takes about 15-20 years for new materials from research to large-scale access to the market. From the 11thFive-Year Plan, China has done a lot of research work in the research aspect of molten salt, high temperature heat-absorbing film and solid heat storage, but it takes a period of time to enter commercialization. The current research is not enough to be adopted by industrialization immediately, and this time difference causes the study of materials divorced from industrialization, but also causes the revolutionary development delay of solar thermal electricity.
Another technology of vital important and needs to be studied is water saving.
The EU Horizon 2020 has deployed major projects in this area at a cost of € 12 million, which shows that this is a concerned problem in the global CSP circles, not just in China. Water saving is the first task of solar thermal electricity sustainable development. I visited Aksai County, Gansu yesterday, and the leaders in Aksai County insisted to drive us to see their water source of solar thermal electricity industry park a hundred kilometers away. The local cadres are well aware of the importance of water to the development of solar thermal electricity. About 5 years ago, no one mentioned water-saving research, and now we begin to find the importance of water resources, and then what will happen in the next five years? We will be more concerned with water. Enterprises grasping the in-depth water-saving solar thermal electricity technology companies will have more room for development, although the current 20 demonstration projects do not need to consider the issue of in-depth water-saving.
Finally, I want to express my gratitude to all the participants, all the sponsors, especially the conference staff, because they made a lot of efforts to organize a successful conference. From the opening to the closing ceremony, the conference goes smoothly. Thank you all! I wish you a pleasant return trip all the way and get more gains in the afternoon visit!
