Bonfring International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management Science, Vol. 9, No.

3, September 2019 16

Enhancement of Thermal Performance of Solar

Parabolic Trough Concentrator-Techniques-
Review
M.V. Bindu and Joselin Herbert

Abstract--- The worldwide increasing energy demand and

the alarming situation of the depletion of fossil fuel drive us to
focus on deriving energy from renewable sources. The solar
thermal power generation (STP) uses different types of solar
concentrating technologies and many researches in this area
have proven that the parabolic trough concentrator (PTC)
technology is suitable for power generation. A PTC is a line-
focus concentrator which focuses the solar irradiance to fall on
the absorber tube and to transfer to the heat transfer fluid
(HTF). The PTC work under the temperature range of 60° to
400 C°. The performance of the PTC can be improved by
improving the optical and thermal efficiency. In this paper the
recent researches on the thermal performance enhancement by
using nano fluid and different absorber tube fluid are studied Fig.1: Classification of PTC based on Temperature range
and presented. In this paper a few techniques to improve the thermal
Keywords--- PTC, HTF, Nano Fluid, DNI. efficiency of the system is studied and presented.

II. COMPONENTS OF PTC

I. INTRODUCTION
The PTC consist of a reflector of parabolic shape made of
T HE worldwide energy demand is met by the energy
produced form non-renewable energy sources. These
energy source are basically fossil fuels, burning which
aluminium or low iron glass that concentrates the solar
irradiation to fall on the absorber placed at its focal point. The
receiver is filled with the HTF which absorbs the heat energy
liberates green house gases causing environmental pollution
which and is stored for producing electricity. A suitable
and ozone layer depletion. The alarming situation of depletion
tracking mechanism of single axis tracking or double axis
of fossil fuel forces to focus on searching ways to produce
tracking is provided to follow the sun. Research work done to
energy from other sources such as renewable energy sources
improve the efficiency of the PTC by improving the reflector
and solar power generation find very attractive among the
properties has reached the efficiency of 95%.[1] The attention
others, since it is readily available in abundance. Several
can be shifted to the receiver of PTC to improve the efficiency
technologies have emerged and a lot of research work has
by different methods such as using inserts. using material and
been done on the techniques to harvest the solar energy form
using nano fluid as the HTF. The Fig.2 shows the schematic of
the solar radiation. The concentrating solar power
a PTC.
technology(CSP) is a good one where the operating
temperature varies from 40°C to 1500°C. Because of the
reduced greenhouse gas emission, high economic returns and
the built-in storage capability, CSP is finding wide
applications. Among these the PTC is the most promising one
since it can convert the light energy in to heat energy and can
be used for further applications. The Fig.1.shows the
classification of the PTC based on the range of working
temperature.

M.V. Bindu, PhD Scholar, NICHE, Noorul Islam Centre for Higher
Education, Kumaracoil, Thuckalay, K.K. Dist.
E-mail: bindumvmohanan@gmail.com
Josilene Herbert, Asso. Professor, NICHE, Noorul Islam Centre for
Higher Education, Kumaracoil, Thuckalay, K.K. Dist. Fig.2: Schematic of PTC
E-mail: joselineherbert@gmail.com
DOI:10.9756/BIJIEMS.9033

ISSN 2277-5056 | © 2019 Bonfring

Bonfring International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management Science, Vol. 9, No. 3, September 2019
III. ENHANCEMENT OF THERMAL EFFICIENCY
The thermal efficiency of a can be improved by using
different nano fluid at different concentrations. And using
evacuated receiver tube the heat loss due to the convection can
be reduced.
A. Receiver Performance
Evacuated collector tube are used as receiver for PTC. The
cost of production and maintenance of the evacuated collector
tube is very high while the efficiency is very low. The
continuous use of the tube may even reduce the vacuum
degree affecting the thermal efficiency of the PTC. The cavity
receiver works on the black cavity effect and the vacuum
surrounding is not required. Many research work has been
carried out in this area by considering difference shape of
receivers such as cylindrical cavity, triangular cavity and
trapezoidal cavity receiver. The Fig.3. shows the proposed
model by Xueling Lia[2] consisting of a parabolic reflector
that concentrate the solar irradiance to fall on the receiver
through the glass window and is absorbed by the inner arc
surface of the receiver tube.
Fig.3: (a)Structure of the Linerar Cavity Receiver[2]
Fig.4: (b)Cossection of the Cavity Receiver[2]
A two dimensional mathematical model is proposed and
analysed using the FLUENT software to study the thermal
performance by analysing the effect of the inclination angle,
collecting temperature, surface emissivity and aperture width.
The results are compared with the Solel's UVAC series
evacuated collector tube is shown in Fig.3. It shows that the
linear cavity receiver can be replace with the traditional
evacuated collector tube with increasing the collecting
temperature and reducing the maintenance cost.
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17
Fig.5: Comparison of Thermal Performance [2]
The study revealed that even though the optical loss
decreases with the increase in the aperture width the heat loss
also increases. The reasonable aperture width is suggested as
50-70mm width considering the losses and the manufacturing
considerations
IV. NANO FLUID
The main component of a PTC is the receiver tube which
absorbs the solar irradiance falling on the trough by focusing.
In then conventional absorber the solar radiation is the
absorber tube made of metal and transferred to the working
fluid which is water or oil by conduction and convection. In a
different method the absorber tube will be made of glass and
the nanofluid will be passing through the glass tube which
allows the direct contact between the fluid and the solar
irradiance. Recent researches in this area has presented many
mathematical model and governing equations to study and
analyse the behaviour of the use of nano fluid as the HTF and
its effect on the enhancement of thermal efficiency as well as
the structural stability of the receiver tube. The Figure.6.
shows the arrangement of the conventional receiver and the
nanofluid receiver tube. The results of many research work
shows that enhancement of thermal efficiency by nanfluids is
about 5 to 10% with the conventional technique.
Fig.6: (a)Conventional HCE. (b) Nanofluid-based HCE
Many research work carried out with Cu/Therminol VP-
1[3], CuO, SiO2, TiO2 and Al2O2 with therminol-55[4], Ag
with Diphenyle oxide and biphenyl[5], TiO2 with DI-H2O[6],
CuO nano-powder with air[7] has shown that the heat carrying
capacity increases which in turn increases the thermal
efficiency.
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B. Enhancement through Nano Fluid

Even though many have studied the effect on nanofluids
on the thermal enhancement, Yanjuan Wan[8] has conducted
the performance analysis using Al 2 O 3 /synthetic oil nanofluid
by focussing the attention on the thermal and structural
characteristics of the receiver tube when the nano fluid is used
as the HTF. The results have been compared with the
traditional PTC system with synthetic oil. The influence of
volume concentration, inlet temperature, inlet velocity and
DNI on the structural and thermal performance are reported. A
conservation equations an optical-thermal-stress coupling
model is developed to analyse the parameters. The
comparisons with the traditional system shows that the
efficiency of the system is increased by reducing the inlet
velocity , and temperature gradients in the absorber tube
which in turn reduces the thermal stress and the reviver
deformation. Fig.9: Performance with DNI[8]
Zeyu Liu [9] has proposed a PTC system which uses the
The Fig.7. shows that the collector efficiency is increasing
magnetic nano fluids (MNF) and has shown with the
with the increase in volume fraction.
experimental results that the system is highly efficient. The
experimental arrangement is shown in the Fig.10.

Fig.10: Experimental Setup [9]

Fig.7: Collector Efficiency Volume Fraction[8] The efficiency of the PTC is calculated using the equation
The Figure.8. shows that the when the inlet velocity is low 𝑄𝑄̇𝑈𝑈
the collector efficiency is very high with the traditional PTC. 𝜂𝜂 =
𝐼𝐼𝐷𝐷 𝐴𝐴𝐶𝐶
Figure.9. shows that the CTD is lower for the PTC using Where I D and A C are the normal irradiance and area of the
nanoflid and HTF and the experimental results showed that collector. Q is the heat absorbed by the MNF.
when the volume fraction was increased form 0 to 0.05 the
The presence of magnetic field accelerate the heat transfer
deformation decreased form 2.11mm to 0.54mm and its
rate [9].
because of the decrease in temperature gradient.

Fig.8: Performance with Velocity[8] Fig.11: Comparison of Efficiency for MNF [34]

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Bonfring International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management Science, Vol. 9, No. 3, September 2019
Pablo D[10] presented a heat transfer model that uses nano
fluid as the HTF. The nanofluid used for the test was Al 2 O 3
with water. The model was simulated in the engineering
equation solver software and the result were compared with
the experimental data which were in good correlation. The
Figure.12.a and 12.b explains the heat transfer models. The
heat transfer coefficient was found out from experimental
dataand the heat transfer analysis was carried out considering
the conduction and radiation using the flurries law and Stefan
boltzman law with the shape factors of geometry of
radioactive surfaces.
Fig.12: (a) Thermal Resistance Model[10]
Fig.12: (b) Thermal Resistance Model[10]
The experimental set up is shown Figure.13
Fig.13: Hydraulic diagram for experimental tests[10]
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Table 1: The Behaviour of HTF for Different Volumetric
Concentrations
The thermal efficiency is enhanced for the varying volume
fraction.
Hamidreza [11] in the work calculated the exergy and
energy efficiency with the nano particle volume fraction
varying from 0 to .05 and environment wind speed velocity
varying form still air condition to 10m/s with the normalized
HTF inlet temperature. The variation trends in the exergy and
thermal efficiency was reported the same for increasing wind
speed condition. The addition of .05 nano particles increases
the exergy efficiency about 19%.
Bennet[12] has designed a two stage hybrid PTC with a
secondary CPC reflector for spectrum splittingspectria
splitting and double-junction InGaP/GaAs. Using alumina
based suspended solar cells was tested up tp 600 °C for the
first time.
Fig.14: Cossection of the Cavity Receiver[26]
A half-rim angle and half acceptance angle are ϕ=45°and
θ= ±0.6°. A side-by-side schematic of a typical single stage
trough and the proposed two-stagecollector are shown in as a
result of the optimization, the concentration ratio of the final
system is reducedto50X and the concentration acceptance
product(CAP = C/Cmax = Csinθ) is reduced to 0.52.
Bonfring International Journal of Industrial Engineering and Management Science, Vol. 9, No. 3, September 2019
Fig.15: Cossection of the Cavity Receiver[26]
The heat collecting unit with secondary reflector and solar
cell is shown in the Fig.16.
Fig.16: Cossection of the Cavity Receiver[26]
The combination of the two-stage trough and solid
particulate heat transfer fluid gives a temperature increase
from 400 to 600 and this technology can be industrial process
heating and concentrating solar power applications.
C. Conclusion and Future Work
The recent developments in the enhancement of PTC
system by considering different parameters are explained
giving emphasis on the method which used the nano particles
in the absorber tube. Different works carried with
methodology of the work is presented in this paper. The
review find the following aspects
• The nano particle increases the thermal
performance of the HTF as well as it has some
effect on the structural property of the absorber
tube.
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• By changing the volume concentration of the nano
particles the design can be optimised.
• Use of secondary reflector increases the efficiency
of the PTC.
Further work can be carried out by considering the following
conditions
• nano particles with phases change materials ca be
studied
• Optimisation of the design of PTC using inserts and
secondary reflector along with the nano fluid can be
studied.
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