Speaking at the ongoing Stationary Energy Storage India (SESI) 2024 conference in New Delhi today (March 19), Rajan Varshney, Deputy General Manager, NTPC Limited discussed thermal storage and its significance as a clean power source.
"We have a clean power source, that is completely clean and has the least embedded carbon," Varshney noted. EVs have embedded carbon of 50gm/unit of electricity supplies, and CSP hardly has embedded carbon of 5-7gm/ unit of electricity supplies, the reason for this is that it does not require any rare materials as a result there is no reliance on imports.
"It is glass and molten salts...these are easily available raw materials… and when they run for 100 years they are just like investments," he added.
Varshney further drew comparisons between investments required for a new coal-based plant capacity and CSP, noting that the cost is also not much of a challenge.
A new coal-based plant requires INR9-10 crore of investment per MWh and a CSP-based plant that runs for 21-hour requires about INR 15 crore per MWh, but a coal-based plant would run 25-30 years whereas a CSP-based one runs for 70-80 years, so the cost is also not much, he explained.