Design and performance study of a parabolic fresnel hybrid solar collector

Abstract

The need for energy is increasing globally as population and newlineconsumption increases, while at the same time resource depletion is causing newlinesupply-demand gap. Fossil fuels are the major energy resources but are also newlineresponsible for many environmental impacts including climate change. The newlineneed to increase energy production and reduce environmental impacts newlinerequires the energy sector to transition towards renewable energy like solar, newlinewind, etc. Solar thermal is one of the major renewable energy sources and can newlineprovide energy in the form of both heat and electricity. It can be used for newlinedomestic and industrial applications with varied degree of decentralization. newlineThe major roadblock to the large-scale adoption of solar energy is the cost, newlinewhile the conventional energy from fossil fuels is cheap. To compete and gain newlinewide acceptance the cost of solar systems has to decrease or the efficiency newlinemust increase. newlineParabolic Trough Concentrator (PTC) and Linear Fresnel Concentrator newline(LFC) are the two major solar thermal technologies. While PTC is highly newlineefficient it has high initial and overall cost, LFC is cheaper with low newlineefficiency. The LFC has two major design advantages; they are the use of newlinenearly flat mirrors and stationary absorber. This work focusses on combining newlinethese two features in a system with the high efficiency of a parabolic newlinecollector. A hybrid collector called Hybrid Parabolic Linear Fresnel Collector newline(HPLFC) with flat plates whose midpoints are pivoted on a parabolic profile newlinewith a stationary absorber has been proposed and investigated. A novel newlinetracking system controlling all the flat plates with a single mechanical link newlinehas been designed and tested. The investigation of the HPLFC has been newlinecarried out with an analytical model developed using Scilab and an optical newlinemodel has also been developed with SolTrace. newline