(1) a receiver with freely falling particles, and
 (2) a design in which sand is heated while flowing (more slowly) through a porous medium.

The awards are listed at http://www1.eere.energy.gov/solar/sunshot/csp_sunshotrnd.html

Approach

The SunShot CSP R&D program seeks to accelerate progress toward the cost target of $0.06 per kilowatt-hour through novel and revolutionary research into CSP technologies. The awardees are working to produce dramatic improvements in CSP performance and cost by:

• Increasing system efficiency through higher-temperature operations

• Minimizing optical and thermal efficiency losses in the system

• Reducing the cost of the solar field.

Innovation

This applied research program supports technological developments that have the potential for dramatic improvements over existing commercial and near-commercial CSP systems. The revolutionary concepts being explored by the awardees target each subsystem, including collectors, receivers, power cycles, and associated hardware.