Heat Efficiency of Trough Solar Vacuum Receiver

Abstract

The heat loss and thermal performance of solar parabolic trough vacuum receiver were experimentally measured and analyzed by heat transfer model. According to the present experiments, the heat loss of solar parabolic trough vacuum receiver has good agreement with the heat loss of vacuum receiver from Solel company. As the wall temperature increase from 108°C to 158°C, the heat loss of solar parabolic trough vacuum receiver remarkably increases from 35 Wm-2to 57 Wm-2. The heat transfer model of parabolic trough solar receiver is then theoretically investigated due to the energy balances between the heat transfer fluid, absorber tube, glass envelope and surroundings. When solar radiation flux is constant, the heat efficiency of solar parabolic trough system decreases with the wall temperature and oil temperature. When solar radiation flux or solar concentration ratio increases, the heat efficiency of solar parabolic trough system increases.