The industrial sector accounts for approximately 30% of the total energy consumption in the OECD countries. The major share of the energy that is needed in industrial companies, services and agricul-ture is used for heating and cooling of buildings and for production processes at temperatures from ambient up to approx. 400 - 500 °C. This is a temperature range that can be addressed with solar thermal technologies at a high TRL.
To be able to make use of solar heat in industry and to support this market sector for the solar ther-mal industry, it is necessary to integrate solar thermal systems into the energy supply schemes in a suitable way.
The main objective of the IEA SHC / SolarPACES Joint Task 64 / IV was to identify, verify and pro-mote the role of solar thermal systems in combination with other heat supply technologies such as fossil and renewable-fuelled boilers, combined heat and power plants, or heat pumps.
Task 64 started in January 2020 and formally ended in December 2023 and was divided into five sub-tasks: Subtask A - Integrated Energy Systems, Subtask B - Modularisation, Subtask C - Simulation and Planning Tools, Subtask D - Standardisation/Certification, Subtask E - Market Introduction Guide. All project results are available on the task website
https://task64.iea-shc.org.
Main findings («Take-Home Messages»)
Three quarters of the energy demand of industry is heat. 50 % of this heat is used at tempera-tures from just above ambient temperature to approx. 400 °C, that can be delivered by of the shelf market-available solar thermal technologies.
For efficient decarbonization, SHIP (Solar Heat for Industrial Processes) technologies can be integrated in hybrid systems with e.g. waste heat, heat pumps, PV, PVT, geothermal.
Large heat storages that enable adaptation of supply and demand profiles increase the solar fraction of the total energy supply cost-efficiently by shifting the solar supply to low-radiation times.
The total technical potential of SHIP is far above currently installed capacity. Increased imple-mentation will lead to significant project cost reductions and further accelerate cost competitiveness in key markets.