DESIGN OF PARABOLIC TROUGH COLLECTOR SYSTEM

FOR DOMESTIC HEATING AND AIR CONDITIONING

ENG. ABDALLAH Y.AL-DAHER

STUDENT NUMBER

MASTER OF RENEWABLE ENERGY ENGINEERING

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING

COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

SUPERVISOR: PROF. SALAH AL-THYABAT

There are several ways to harness solar energy including photovoltaics, solar heating
& cooling, concentrating solar power, and passive solar systems. Thermal stations which
called concentrated solar power(CSP), are plants that use the heat generated by solar radiation
to evaporate water and exploitation of the vapor energy to operate turbines which in turn
generate electricity. CSP requires high direct normal irradiance (>2000Kwh/year) which
indicates that regions such as Middle East, North Africa, and Southern Africa are excellent
regions to build CSP plants [1].

Most current CSP plants are based on parabolic trough technology(PTC) since it is the
most maturetechnology and the lowest development risk. The PTC consist of solar collectors
(mirrors), heat receivers, and support structures. The parabolic-shaped mirrors, which can be
100m long and 5 m in diameter, are constructed by forming a sheet of reflective material into
a parabolic shape that concentrates incoming sunlight onto a central receiver tube at the focal
line of the collector. usually PTC are equipped by a single-axis tracking system to orient both
solar collectors and heat receivers toward the sun.

Figure 1: Parabolic trough collector [1[

2. PROBLEM STATEMENT AND INNOVATION

Energy cost for domestic heating in winter and air-conditioning in summer represent
large portion of most domestic expenditures. Therefore, this project aims to design small
scale PTC which can be installed on the roof of any house to harness solar energy and utilize
the thermal energy for heating in winter and to operate air conditioner in summer.

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3. OBJECTIVE AND AIMS

The main objective of this thesis is to harness solar energy and to use it in domestic
heating and cooling while the main aims are:

o To design and build a small-scale PTC solar thermal unit.

4. METHODOLOGY AND EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN

The PTC as shown in Figure 1 consist of solar collectors (mirrors), heat receivers, and
support structures. The parabolic-shaped mirrors are constructed by forming a sheet of
reflective material into a parabolic shape that concentrates incoming sunlight onto the
receiver tube at the focal line of the collector. The mirror should be constructed of high
reflective material, and since the solar radiation has a wide range of wavelength spectrum, the
weighted specular solar reflectivity of the surface which defines as the fraction of solar
energy that is reflected from the mirror to the receiver tube is the most important factor. The
silver coated glass is the most common material used for parabolic trough mirrors, yet low
cost silver coated polymer film called ReflecTech which can be placed on any nonporous
surface has been developed recently [2].

Figure 2 schematic diagram of parabolic trough collector [2]

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 The receiver comprises the absorber tube made of coated stainless steel inside an
evacuated glass envelope to reduce heat losses. The tube coating allows selective absorption
of short wave solar radiation and minimizing the emitting of long wave radiation. The
amount of energy received by the receiver tube is measured by the intercept factor which
defined as the fraction of solar radiation reflected by the mirror to the amount of radiation
received by the receiver tube.

Heat transfer fluid (HTF) is circulated through the absorber tubes to collect the solar
energy and transfer it either to the steam generator or to the heat storage system, most
existing parabolic troughs use synthetic oils as the heat transfer fluid, which are stable up to
400°C. “Thermo oil “is a eutectic mixture of biphenyl and diphenyl oxide that is liquid until
12 c and have high specific heat capacity, so it is reliable and no means for antifreeze
protection is required. However, some plants replace thermo oil with mineral oil which is less
expensive, but its main disadvantage is instability at temperature above 300 C. recently, some
new CSP use more cheaper HTF called molten salt which consist of 60 %NaNO3 and 40 %
KNO3 . molten salt is a fertilizer, so it is cheap, non-toxic, and none flammable. Although
molten salt is stable up to 540 C which enables the integration of energy storage within the
system, its main disadvantage is the higher freezing temperature 120-220 C which requires a
robust antifreeze system [3].

The PTC array mirror which can be 100 meters (m) long curved aperture of 5 m to 6
m is equipped with a single-axis tracking mechanism to orient both solar collectors and heat
receivers toward the sun. PTC are usually aligned North-South and track the sun as it moves
from East to West to maximize the collection of energy.

The aim of this project is to design small scale unit of PTC that can be fit on the roof
of any house with integrated heat storage system. the heat collected by the PTC is used to
heat the molten salt which in turn used to generate vapor to produces AC current by a turbine
or to heat water for space heating and air conditioning. a schematic diagram of the proposed
system is shown in Figure 2.

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 Figure3 schematic diagram of the proposed small-scale PTC system

5. THESIS TIMELINE

Make a table showing the milestones of your thesis and their respected time. a
possible format is shown below,but feel free to use any format

Semester I Semester II

Month1 Month2 Month3 Month4 Month1 Month2 Month3 Month4

Design of experiments

Testing and optimization

Writing up

Viva voce

6. REFERENCES

[1] NREL (2012), Concentrating solar power project Database, US department of energy,
available at: https://www.nrel.gov/csp/solarpaces/by_country.cfm.
[2] Viebahn peter, kronshage, Stefan, TriebFeanz, lechon Yolanda (2008): Final Report on
Technical Data, Costs, and Life Cycle Inventories of Solar Thermal Power Plants.
Deliverable 12.2-RS I a of EUIP-NEEDS. www.needs-project.org.

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[3] Duffie, john A., and Beckman, William A., Solar Engineering of thermal processes, 2nd
edition. Wiley, New York, 1991.