Performance Investigation of Cylindrical Cavity Receiver Using Roughened Surfaces

Abstract

Solar cavity receiver is an integral part of the solar parabolic dish collectors used for absorbing concentrated solar irradiation. The performance of the receivers can be enhanced utilizing different types of heat transfer fluids (HTF) and modified geometries. The thermal performance of a redesigned cavity receiver with solid semi-circular tube attached to its surface was investigated using CFD three-dimensional simulation. The influence of operating and geometric parameters (i.e., inlet mass flow rate and inlet temperature) were investigated. The results obtained shows that, redesigned solar cavity receiver has thermal efficiency of 8.49-10.27% higher than a normal cavity receiver with an inlet flow rate of 0.01-0.04 kg/s under the same environmental and operating conditions. The temperature of outlet of HTF increases with increases in inlet temperature for Therminol66 oil. The comparison of thermal performance using different HTF (i.e., Therminol66, Ethylene Glycol, Water) is also conducted and it is found that Therminol66 oil gives 9% and 17% higher outlet temperature than ethylene glycol and water respectively at intake flow rate of 0.02 kg/s.