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arXiv · 2402.09675

Repurposing Coal Power Plants into Thermal Energy Storage for Supporting Zero-carbon Data Centers

Yifu Ding·Serena Patel·Dharik Mallapragada·Robert James Stoner
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Abstract

Coal power plants will need to be phased out and face stranded asset risks under the net-zero energy system transition. Repurposing coal power plants could recoup profits and reduce carbon emissions using the existing infrastructure and grid connections. This paper investigates a retrofitting strategy that turns coal power plants into thermal energy storage (TES) and zero-carbon data centers (DCs). The proposed capacity expansion model considers the co-locations of DCs, local renewablewith the system-generation, andlevel coal retir energy storage ement and retrofitting. We optimize the DC system configurations under the hourly-matching carbon policy and flexible operations. Results show that under hourly-matching carbon constraints, the retrofitted TES could complement the operations of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) to reduce system costs. This could render DCs with optimal co-located renewable generations and energy storage more cost-effective than unconstrained DCs.

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Yifu Ding, Serena Patel, Dharik Mallapragada, Robert James Stoner. 2024-02-15. Repurposing Coal Power Plants into Thermal Energy Storage for Supporting Zero-carbon Data Centers. https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.09675

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