Artículos SCI

Cheap, efficient, and non-toxic energy storage technologies are urgently needed to handle the rapidly increasing penetration of intermittent renewable energies into the grid. This work explores the use of limestone and dolomite for energy storage in concentrated solar power (CSP) plants by means of the calcium looping (CaL) process based on the multicycle carbonation/calcination of CaO. An efficient integration of the CaL process into CSP plants involves high temperature carbonation and calcination at moderate temperatures in a close CO2 cycle for power generation. These conditions differ from those of the CaL process for CO2 capture, which lead to CaO deactivation as extensively reported in recent years. In contrast, we show that limestone- and dolomite-derived CaO give rise to a high residual conversion at CaL-CSP conditions and in short residence times, which would facilitate the development of a competitive and clean CSP technology with permanent energy storage.

Morphological, microstructural and vibrational properties of hematite (alpha-Fe2O3) nanocrystals with a rhombohedral shape and rounded edges, obtained by forced hydrolysis of iron(III) solutions under a fast nucleation, have been investigated in detail as a function of aging time. These studies allowed us to propose a detailed formation mechanism and revealed that these nanocrystals are composed of four {104} side facets, two {110} faces at the edges of the long diagonal of the nanocrystals and two {-441} facets as the top and bottom faces. Also, the presence of nanoscopic pores and fissures was evidenced. The vibrational bands of such nanocrystals were shifted to lower frequencies in comparison with bulk hematite ones as the nanocrystal size was reduced due to phonon confinement effects. Also, the indirect and direct transition band gaps displayed interesting dependences on the aging time arising from quantum confinementand surface effects