Thermal performance optimization of rectangular cavity receiver for cross linear concentrating solar power system

Abstract

ABSTRACT A thermodynamic analysis was performed on a newly developed concentrated solar power (CSP) technology known as the Cross-Linear (CL), which addresses the issue of cosine loss in conventional CSP technology. The analytical model has been developed and validated using experimental data collected at the experimental site situated in Bhopal, India. The analysis was performed under direct normal irradiance of 775 W/m2 with the key objective to determine the optimum inlet condition of the heat transfer fluid (HTF) considering three optimization parameters: HTF outlet temperature, energy, and exergy efficiency of the receiver. Also, the exergy of the solar field is investigated depending on the available solar irradiation throughout the day for three different configurations of the heliostat field. After a comprehensive analysis of the results, the optimal air inlet temperature range was observed to be between 373 and 423 K, and the optimal air mass flow rate was overserved to be 0.0925 kg/s (333 kg/h), which provides energy and exergy efficiency values within 50% to 60% and 28% to 34%, respectively. The maximum electrical exergy efficiency for 30 kW plant capacity is observed to be around 70% at solar noon with a cosine factor of around 0.9 for 4-hour duration.