Hi Paul and team
Simple question about the Parasitic power solar field HTF pump electrical power usage. I have had a look through the forum, the help file and the physical trough report. I am battling to find how this parasitic demand is calculated. In my results, the value rarely exceeds 1.3 MWe, which is way too low. Most plants I have seen in SA have installed capacities of around 3x 2 MW or more.
In the Parasitics inputs, the only parameters we can change is the "Required pumping power for HTF through power block" and the "Required pumping power for HTF through storage" (HTF flow to and from the TES and power block, according to your explanation at this post:
sam.nrel.gov/node/74810), but nowhere is there any input that changes the "Parasitic power solar field HTF pump", nor any indication of how this is calculated in the help file or report.
Could you please provide an indication/reference as to how this is calculated? The problem is that my Net power outputs are too high relative to the Gross power, when I compare it with measured data for a reference plant I am modelling.
Thanks
Frank