Principal Research Scientist Alfonso Chinnici and professors Gus Nathan and Bassam Dally who direct the Centre for Energy Technology (CET) at the University of Adelaide, have developed a solar “combustor” that can run round the clock and provide temperatures as high as 1500°C. Processes in iron, nickel, alumina, and copper mining require continuous heat at such high temperatures.
The combustor is a hybrid that can combine solar energy from a solar farm or heliostat field with the heat generated from the combustion of renewable fuels such as hydrogen or syngas.
What will appeal to mining CEOs is that the combustor can run either 100% on solar or 100% by fuel combustion.
In the lab, the team used simulated solar radiation with high powered lamps. The 30-kW direct solar hydrogen combustor has been running continuously for 7,000 hours, generating heat of 800°C.
The “magic” device had NOx emissions close to zero.
The device has been patented and is ready for “on sun” testing on a larger scale such as 250kW or more.
Read more about this “magic device” HERE.