Performance study of coal-fired power generation system combined with renewable solar energy source based on thermodynamic analysis

China’s coal resources are abundant, so the total amount of carbon emissions is large. In order to achieve ecologically sustainable development, clean energy such as solar energy is used to generate electricity. This study briefly introduced the composition and working process of solar energy and coal-fired power generation system, analyzed its working principle with thermodynamics, established the corresponding thermodynamic model to simulate and then analyzed the change of the photoelectric conversion efficiency and the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) with the change of collector area under different loads of solar energy and coal-fired power generation system. The results showed that the photoelectric conversion efficiency increased first and then decreased with the increase of the collector area under different loads, and the higher the load was, the higher the photoelectric conversion efficiency would be; the LCOE decreased first and then increased with the increase of the collector area under different loads, and the higher the load was, the lower the LCOE would be.