Economic impact of solar extinction in thermoelectric solar tower plants in Spain

Spain is a country with high levels of Direct Normal Irradiance, having a great interest for development of thermoelectric solar tower plants. Nevertheless, the country is affected by occasional Saharan dust episodes, which increase solar extinction. Typically, large solar tower plants have considerable distances between the heliostats and the tower, often exceeding one kilometer. Consequently, the solar extinction between the heliostats and receivers has an adverse impact on the radiative power and, as a result, on the economic payback of the installation. This phenomenon represents a significant factor in the selection of optimal locations for them. In this work, an average annual solar extinction map of Spain was elaborated based on a rigorously validated model at Plataforma Solar de Almería (Almería, Spain). The solar extinction for each pixel were estimated with the model. These results have been employed to analyze the economic impact of solar extinction in thermoelectric solar tower plants in Spain. A hypothetical plant for the entire country was considered, and the Levelized Cost of Energy was studied. The results obtained from this analysis indicate that the cost of generating one kilowatt-hour of energy could potentially increase by up to 13% in some regions due to solar extinction.