Innovative new solar parabolic trough collector enhanced by corrugated receiver surface with PCM and turbulator inside

Abstract

A solar trough parabolic collector (STPC) has a reflecting surface that is curved into the shape of a parabola. An implementation study on solar trough parabolic collector thermal performance with four different volumetric flow rate values showing the effect of the Reynolds number with multiple passive enhancement approaches was applied tothe solar collector. The first approach is to use a corrugated copper receiver tube, which increases the collector solar heat absorbed by increasing the receiver tube surface area and turbulence. The second enhancement method was done using paraffin wax PCM (phase change material). Phase change material is used as an athermal storage material for heat absorbed by the collector, increasing the outlet water temperature through the night while slightly affecting the day water outlet temperature. By applying this approach, the solar trough parabolic collector enhances the heat transfer rate by around 40 % for all the volumetric flow rates adopted in this work. The third solar trough parabolic collector enhancing method was done by adding a turbulator twisted tape inside the corrugated receiver copper tube. This approach method increases the solar trough parabolic collector performance by around 35 % for all selected volumetric flow rate values. Adopting the three enhancing techniques on solar trough parabolic collector increased the overall thermal efficiency to approximately 85 %. The solar trough parabolic collector heat transfer coefficient, pressure drop, and friction factor were also investigated. A comparison study with previous works was also adopted in this work, which proves a superior thermal performance of the Innovative solar trough parabolic collector of this work over the earlier studies work.