Experimental study of compound parabolic concentrator with flat plate receiver

Abstract

In this paper, an experimental work has been performed to investigate the performance of a new Compound Parabolic Concentrator (CPC) with a flat plate receiver model. The CPC structure has been designed based on the two offset large parabolas reflector surfaces with a concentration ratio equal to 1.5. The experiments have been carried out in winter 2019 from beginning of January to end of March using the solar radiation of Mosul city in Iraq under outdoor clear sky condition for around 8 h during the day. The experimental results indicate that the increase in water mass flowrates enhances the efficiency of the collector and reduces the outlet water temperature. The results show that the change in months from January to March has little impact on the total solar radiation. The maximum solar radiation has been recorded in March and the peak value has been observed between 12 PM and 1 PM. The results also indicate that the CPC provides a maximum efficiency 26.5% and hence, sufficient consideration should be taken while designing such CPC collectors. It is evident that CPC area has significantly effect on the collector performance. The present study provides a useful tools for calculating the efficiency of CPC for Mosul city.