The core competitiveness of leading brands

Since CSP thermal oil was successfully applied to SEGS's first commercial solar thermal power plant in California in 1984, its product components have been known to the public, and its production technology is not a secret. However, even so, the global market has still produced two major oligopolies, and there has not been a situation where many manufacturers share the market. What are the reasons for this? According to CSPPLAZA reporters, Dowtherm A products have a market share of 75% in the global thermal power generation market for thermal oil. The reason for such a high market share is closely related to Dow's production process and quality control. It can be said that the quality control of the product is the main reason why Dow thermal oil leads the CSP market. Chen Hao, Technical Service Manager of Suzhou Shounuo Thermal Oil Co., Ltd., stated that the essential properties of biphenyl ether thermal oil determine that its maximum operating temperature is only 400 ℃. It is impossible to further increase its operating temperature unless another more suitable thermal oil product for solar thermal power generation is discovered. But over the past 30 years, the production process of CSP thermal oil has been continuously improved, and its service life and product quality have been gradually enhanced.

Domestic thermal oil breakthrough

CSPPLAZA believes that there may be three reasons why domestic heat transfer oil has not yet been able to compete with the two major brands of Dow and Shounuo. Firstly, Dow and Shounuo had early research and development of CSP thermal oil products. During the first wave of enthusiasm in the solar thermal power generation market in the 1980s, they had already laid the technical foundation for their products and rapidly grown into leading brands in the solar thermal power generation thermal oil market; Secondly, the start-up of China's solar thermal power generation market is slow, and domestic thermal oil manufacturers do not have much investment and research and development motivation for CSP thermal oil products; Thirdly, for developers of solar thermal power plant projects, thermal oil has a huge impact on the operation of the entire light field system and even the overall efficiency of the power plant. For thermal oil products without performance records, they dare not take risks to try because if the product quality is not up to standard, it will cause huge losses to the entire system. Even if some manufacturers claim to be able to produce this type of thermal oil, due to the lack of performance records, project parties dare not adopt it recklessly.

Therefore, domestic thermal oil brands should accelerate the demonstration project application of their products while ensuring the quality of their own products, obtain operational data support from actual projects, and win in the market with higher cost-effectiveness. Hennytherm H1 thermal oil from Hanni Chemical, as the designated supplier of thermal oil for Langsheng in Germany, has been serving the Arenales trough solar thermal power plant in Spain since 2012, and has taken the lead in this area.

The market will open its doors to excellent domestic brands

With the gradual launch of the domestic market for solar thermal power generation and the market for high-temperature utilization of solar energy, the quality of domestic thermal oil products is also continuously improving. Due to the stricter cost control requirements of domestic solar thermal power plant project developers, purchasing domestic thermal oil with higher cost-effectiveness will become a more rational choice. For domestic thermal oil manufacturers, if the quality of their products can be made good enough to compete with international leading brands and have a certain competitive advantage in price, domestic thermal oil brands will surely rise to prominence and make achievements in the domestic solar thermal power generation market and even overseas markets. At present, many domestic thermal oil manufacturers are gradually turning their attention to the field of solar thermal power generation. In the future, China is likely to become the world's largest market for solar thermal power generation. We will fully leverage our technological and localization advantages to assist in the development of domestic solar thermal power projects with better products and services