Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

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Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene

Numerical and experimental investigations of dust effect on CSP

performance under United Arab Emirates weather conditions
Ahmed Amine Hachicha a, *, Israa Al-Sawafta a, Dhouha Ben Hamadou b
a
Sustainable and Renewable Energy Engineering Department, University of Sharjah, PO Box 27272, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates
b
Ecole Nationale d’Ing

enieurs de Tunis, LAMSIN, BP 37, Tunis, Tunisia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Dust is one of the main challenges in implementing concentrating solar power (CSP) systems in arid and
Received 11 March 2019 semi-arid zones. The characterization of dust particles and the measure of the soiling loss effects under
Received in revised form real operating conditions can be useful to select the appropriate cleaning methods and frequency. In this
9 April 2019
study, experimental and numerical investigations were carried out to study the characteristics of dust
Accepted 25 April 2019
Available online 4 May 2019
particles and their effects on the CSP performance under UAE weather conditions. The results showed
that the soiling rate is correlated to the wind speed and direction. The monthly soiling effect was
evaluated for 5 months of exposure with the highest decrease recorded in March. The results of cu-
Keywords:
Concentrated solar power
mulative dust experiment showed a drop in specular reflectivity by about 63% after 3 months of expo-
Specular reflectivity sure. Based on the experimental data, the power soiling loss and thermal performance were determined
Soiling for a parabolic trough solar collector. The predicted results were in consistence with the dust accumu-
Numerical modeling lation leading to a 36% decrease in thermal efficiency. In addition, the power soiling loss was compared
Performance drop with that of PV technology, and it was found that soiling effect is more pronounced in CSP systems by 3
e5 times drop in performance.
© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction CSP reflectors are made of highly reflective mirrors (normally

Solar technologies continue to grow in residential, commercial,
agricultural and industrial sectors in order to meet the current
concerns regarding global climate change, the environment and
energy security in developed and developing countries. Photovol-
taic (PV) and Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) systems are the main
technologies used to convert the solar radiations into electricity.
The efficiency of these solar systems is limited due to many reasons,
one of the most important factors that affect their electrical output
power is soiling [1].
Soiling is the deposition of dust particles on a surface exposed to
natural environment. It is considered as a major concern in desertic
areas for both solar technologies, CSP and PV. Indeed, soiling
significantly influences the performance of solar systems by
reducing the transmittance/reflectance of the intermediate surface
(glass/mirror), which represents an obstacle to the solar conversion
process [2,3].
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: ahachicha@sharjah.ac.ae, ahmedamine.hachicha@yahoo.fr
(A.A. Hachicha).
silvered glass) to concentrate the direct normal irradiance (DNI) on
the absorber tube, and rise the temperature of a heat transfer fluid.
These reflectors are influenced with the dust settlement which
depends on the local weather conditions and the suspended par-
ticles in the atmosphere. Under such circumstances, the sunlight
can be scattered when traveling through the mirror twice, resulting
in a significant decrease of the reflectivity and higher impact
compared to PV technology [4].
According to the available literature, several studies have been
conducted to investigate the dust effect on the PV performance.
However, only few studies have examined the soiling of CSP sys-
tems [5].
Merrouni et al. [6] investigated the soiling effect on different
solar mirror materials (glass and aluminum) and different tilt an-
gles under Moroccan climate for three months. They found an
average cleanliness drop of 45% and 33% for the horizontal glass and
aluminum mirrors, respectively. Heimsath et al. [7] studied the
effect of dust accumulation on the specular reflectance of solar
mirrors with relation to the incident angle. They observed a
decrease in the specular reflectance when increasing the incident
angle, due to the shading and blocking mechanisms caused by the

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2019.04.144
0960-1481/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
264 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276
dust particles.
Bouaddi et al. [8] compared the monthly soiling loss between
CSP aluminum and silvered glass mirrors in two different sites
located in the southwest of Morocco. Their results showed that the
exposed mirrors can lose up to 73% of their cleanliness after 12
weeks of exposure. They also observed that dust accumulation is
depending on the previous soiling level and the rain event which
has a stronger cleaning effect on glass mirrors than aluminum ones.
Fernandez-Garcia et al. [9] studied the reflectance of CSP mirrors
under different cleaning methods during 2 years in a semi-desert
climate. They found out that using demineralized water and a
brush is the most effective cleaning solution with an average effi-
ciency of 98.8% in rainy periods and 97.2% in dry seasons.
Soiling of CSP mirrors is influenced with local weather condi-
tions and the chemistry of the dust particles. Wind and relative
humidity (RH) are important factors that can promote the adhesion
of the dust particles to the mirror surface. Pennetta et al. [10]
investigated the factors affecting dust accumulation on CSP mirrors
in Australia. The results of their study showed a strong influence of
the wind speed and direction on the dust concentration after a
threshold of 3e4 m/s. In addition, the dust adhesion is increased
with the relative humidity as a result of the increased surface en-
ergy and capillary force between the particles and the mirror sur-
face [11]. It is estimated that a RH threshold between 50 and 65% is
responsible to increase the adhesion of the dust particles to the
glass surface forming a cement like layer which requires higher
external force for removal [12].
On the other hand, soiling is affecting the optical efficiency of
CSP mirrors, and thus contributes to the deterioration of the overall
performance. Deffenbaugh et al. [13] incorporated the dust and dirt
accumulation in the optical efficiency to predict the performance of
parabolic trough collectors. The results of their model showed a
degradation rate of 0.2% per day for urban environment and 0.6%
per day for desert environment. They also recommended an opti-
mum cleaning from 45 days to 20 days depending on the climate.
Niknia et al. [14] reported that an amount of 1.5 g/m2 dust could
reduce the instantaneous performance of parabolic trough collec-
tors (PTCs) up to 60% and the average performance during the dust
deposition up to 37%. Strachan and Houser [15] studied soiling ef-
fect on two types of heliostat in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Their
results showed a degradation of the mirror reflectivity from 6 to 9%
due to the dust accumulation. Christo [16] developed a CFD model
to predict the deposition rate and the dust particles trajectories
around a parabolic dish under steady and unsteady flows. Recently,
Bouaddi et al. [17] proposed a Markov switching model to simulate
the soiling dynamics for glass mirrors exposed at Plataforma Solar
de Almeria. Their model is capable to adjust the mirror reflectance
under variable cleaning frequency and fluctuating weather
conditions.
In addition, CSP technology is a promising solar option in United
Arab Emirates with an annual average sum of DNI between
1600 kWh/m2 and 2100 kWh/m2 [18]. Currently, a 100 MW Shams
power plant is operational in Abu Dhabi based on parabolic trough
technology. Recently, new CSP projects are announced under the
UAE energy strategy 2050 with a record-low tariff [19,20]. How-
ever, soiling and harsh weather conditions are the most important
challenges for such technologies.
This paper deals with dust effect on CSP mirrors under UAE
conditions through experimental and numerical investigations. To
the best knowledge of the authors, there is no previous work that
combines experimental and numerical data to evaluate the dust
effect on the performance of CSP systems under UAE or similar
weather conditions. In this work, the reflectance of soiled CSP
mirrors is measured under natural environment. In addition, a
numerical model is developed to estimate the power soiling loss of
a parabolic trough solar collector using the measured reflectivity
data. Moreover, a systematic comparison is carried out to examine
the soiling effect on PV and CSP performance in order to compare
the soiling sensitivity of both solar technologies under UAE
conditions.
2. Experimental setup
The present research study is conducted at the University of
Sharjah to characterize and investigate the natural soiling occurring
on CSP mirrors installed on the rooftop of W12 building with co-
ordinates of 25
170 1600 NL and 55
280 4200 EL.
Silvered glass mirrors (7 cm  7 cm) purchased from A&T In-
dustry Company [21] were used in this work to study the soiling
effect on their solar weighted specular reflectivity. A wooden stand
was designed with three different inclination angles (0
, 25
and
90
) and four directions: NW, NE, SW and SE. The mirrors were
placed on the stand on the roof of the University of Sharjah as
illustrated in Fig. 1.
Solar weighted (Sw) specular reflectivity is the main parameter
to evaluate and assess solar reflectance properties of CSP mirrors
[22,23]. In order to determine this parameter for highly specular
mirrors [23], it is necessary to measure both specular and hemi-
spherical reflectance characteristics. In this study, two instruments
were used to measure both reflectance characteristics. The specular
reflectance was measured using the Multiple Wavelength Portable
Specular Reflectometer Model 15R-RGB designed with an incident
angle of q ¼ 15
and five acceptance angles (4 ¼ 4.6, 7, 15, 25 and
46 mrad). This device is widely used for measurements of highly
specular flat or curved mirrors for solar power applications [24,25].
In addition, the hemispherical reflectance is obtained using Ocean
Optics miniature Maya2000Pro Fiber Optic Spectrometer coupled
with ISP-REF Integrating Sphere as shown in Fig. 1 [26,27]. Table 1
presents the specifications of the used devices as per the manu-
facturer data.
It is worth noting that the procedure adopted in this work is
done by evaluating the specular reflectivity at one wavelength
(650 nm), one acceptance angle (46 mrad) and one incident angle
(15
). Under this assumption, the solar weighted specular reflec-
tance is calculated using the Pettit approximation [28] considering
the solar weighted hemispherical reflectance as explained in
equation (1) [29]. The solar weighted hemispherical reflectance
Fig. 1. Experimental setup.
 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276 265

Table 1
Specifications of the instruments used in this work.

Multiple Wavelength Portable Specular Reflectometer

Manufacturer D&S Co
Model 15R-RGB
Measured Parameter Specular Reflectance at selected 4
Incidence Angle (qi) 15

Wavelength Range (l) 460, 550, 650 and 720 nm
Acceptance Angle (4) 4.6, 7, 15, 25 and 46 mrad
Repeatability ±0.002 reflectance units
Resolution ±0.001 reflectance units

Ocean Optics Maya2000Pro Fiber Optic Spectrometer

Manufacturer Ocean optics

Type of Detector Hamamatsu S10420
Measured Parameter Hemispherical Reflectance
Wavelength Range (l) 200e1100 nm

was calculated by performing a weighted average integral for the reference module as the following equation [30,32].
hemispherical reflectance values.
Pclean  Pdusty
SLPV ¼ (3)
rð650nm; q; 4Þ,rðSw; q; 2pÞ Pclean
rðSw; q; 4Þ ¼ (1)
rð650nm; q; 2pÞ
In addition, the dust particles accumulated on the top of the CSP
This procedure is repeated for all clean and dusty mirrors. mirrors and PV panel were characterized using Scanning Electron
Thereafter, the soiling loss of the solar weighted specular reflec- Microscopy (SEM), Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy (EDS)
tivity was calculated using equation (2) [5,14]. and X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF) tests.

rðSw; q; 4Þclean  rðSw; q; 4Þdusty 3. Numerical model

SLCSPmirrors ¼ (2)
rðSw; q; 4Þclean
In this study, a Matlab code is developed to simulate the optical
Various experiments were conducted to understand the soiling
and thermal performance of a parabolic trough solar collector using
effect on silvered-glass mirrors by measuring their specular and
the experimental data obtained for the mirror reflectance.
hemispherical reflectance under natural environment. A first soil-
LS2 PTC module is selected for this study which is a well-known
ing experiment was performed by placing the mirrors on the
parabolic trough that has been tested in Sandia National Labora-
designed stand with different inclination angles and orientations.
tories [33]. The main parameters of the LS2 PTC are given in Table 3.
After one week of exposure, the reflectivity measurements were
All these parameters are fixed in all examined values and only
taken using the aforementioned instruments. A monthly soiling
the Sw specular reflectivity was changed based on the experi-
experiment was carried out by exposing south facing 25
inclined
mental results. Since the objective of this simulation is to evaluate
mirrors for five consecutive months. The reflectivity measurements
the monthly power drop due to soiling, the meteorological data are
were conducted at the end of each month then the mirrors were
determined as monthly averaged. Based on the exact geographical
cleaned before the starting of the next month. In addition, reflec-
information (latitude and longitude) the average ambient temper-
tivity tests were performed in a weekly basis to investigate the
ature, DNI and wind speed are obtained from Nasa SEE dataset
effect of dust accumulation on the CSP mirrors for more than three
(https://power.larc.nasa.gov/) [34]. Fig. 2 shows the variation of the
months without performing any artificial cleaning.
average monthly climatology conditions for the studied months.
Thereafter, the collected data are compared to a prior experi-
It is worth noting that the DNI shown in Fig. 2 represents the
mental study about dust effect on the performance of PV systems in
total received direct normal irradiance in the location of study for
UAE. In Ref. [30], a 25
tilted and south facing PV modules were
each month. However, in terms of received power, the distribution
installed on the rooftop of W12 building at the University of Sharjah
is slightly different due to the monthly variation of the day length.
and exposed to the same weather conditions during the same
The optical efficiency is defined as the ratio of the energy
exposure period. The main electrical characteristics of the PV
reaching the absorber tube to the received energy by the collector.
module used in this experiment are summarized in Table 2.
It is usually expressed using the various optical properties as
The electrical outputs of dusty and clean modules were also
follows
measured weekly for systematic comparison using a wireless
portable Solmetric PV Analyzer IeV curve tracer [31]. The power h i
soiling loss for PV system is calculated relative to the clean hopt ¼ rclean=dusty tag KðqÞ (4)

Where the main optical properties of the PTC system are defined
Table 2 as: r is the reflectivity of the mirrors (clean or dusty), t is the
Electrical characteristics of the selected PV module. transmissivity of the glass envelope, a is the absorptivity of the
Parameter Value absorber tube, and g is the intercept factor. KðqÞ is the incident
angle modifier that evaluates the variation of the optical properties
Type Polycrystalline Solar Module
Maximum Power, Pmax 5W with the incidence angle q. In practice, this parameter can be
Open Circuit Voltage, Voc 10.5 V determined as the ratio of the efficiency at any given angle and the
Short Circuit Current, Isc 0.58 A efficiency at zero incident angle.
Dimensions 265  160  17 mm For the LS2 PTC the incident angle modifier was obtained
Test Conditions 1000 W/m2, AM 1.5, T ¼ 25
C
experimentally as an empirical fit form.
266 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

Table 3
Characteristics of LS2 PTC.

Parameter Value Parameter Value

Length (L) 7.8 m Receiver absorptance (a) 0.96

Width (W) 5m Glass transmittance (t) 0.95
Focal distance 1.84 m Absorber emittance at 350
C (ε) 0.14
Receiver outer diameter 0.07 m Intercept factor (g) 0.89
Receiver inner diameter 0.066 m Heat transfer fluid Syltherm 800
Glass cover outer diameter 0.109 m Mass flow rate 0.7 kg/s
Glass cover inner diameter 0.115 m Inlet temperature 150
C

Fig. 2. Climatology conditions for the studied months: a) DNI, day length and b) ambient temperature, and wind speed.

 
2 s,Aro , Tr 4  Tc 4
KðqÞ ¼ cosðqÞ  0:0003512,q  0:00003137,q (5) Q_ loss ¼ (8)
1
εr þ 1ε c Aro
εc , Aci
The incident angle is calculated using the solar angles and lati-
tude coordinate for NeS tracking system rotating from East to West. These losses will be transferred to the ambient by convection
In such case, the incident angle is given as [35]. and radiation as following
 
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi Q_ loss ¼ hc;camb ,Aco ,ðTc  Tamb Þ þ εc ,Aco ,s, Tc 4  Tamb 4 (9)
cosðqÞ ¼ cos2 ðqZ Þ þ cos2 ðdÞsin2 ðuÞ (6)

The incident angle is a function of the location and the position
of the sun in the sky. Therefore, the incident angle modifier is
different for each month as shown in Fig. 3.
The output of the optical model is very useful to determine the
absorbed solar radiation which is needed for the energy balance
around the absorber tube. The useful energy is then calculated for
uniform solar flux distribution as following.
Q_ u ¼ hopt ,DNI,Aa  UL ðTr  Tamb Þ,Ar
Where the first term on the right-hand side describes the total
beam radiation intercepted in the aperture of the parabola. The
second term includes the thermal losses from the solar receiver to
the ambient through the different thermal resistances which are
calculated within the overall heat loss coefficient UL .
The different heat fluxes are determined by applying a one-
dimensional energy balance over the different components of the
heat collector element. In this case, the heat losses from the
absorber tube to the glass envelope neglecting the convection
losses in the evacuated receiver are determined as
Where hc;camb is the heat transfer coefficient by convection be-
tween the glass envelope and the ambient which is a function of
the wind speed (Vair) and collector length (L) [35].
8:6,V 0:6
air
hc;camb ¼ (10)
L0:4
In addition, the useful energy in the absorber tube is transferred
to the working fluid through convection heat transfer which con-
tributes to increase its enthalpy as given in:
(7)
 
Q_ u ¼ hc;f r ,Ari , Tr  Tmf ¼ m,C
_ p ,ðTout  Tin Þ (11)
Where Tmf is the bulk mean fluid temperature and can be deter-
mined as Tmf ¼ Tout2þTin .
In order to evaluate the heat transfer coefficient between the
working fluid and the receiver hc;f r , Nusselt number has to be
calculated depending on the flow regimes. Several correlations are
suggested in the literature. In this study, Gnielinski correlation [36]
is selected for the turbulent flow conditions as it was observed to
give reliable results for Reynolds numbers bigger than 2300 [37,38].
 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276 267

Fig. 3. Variation of the incident angle and incident angle modifier for the studied months.

  simple procedure has been tested effectively in previous references

ðfGni =8ÞðRe  1000ÞPr Pr 0:11 [40,41] with a good compromise between accuracy and computa-
Nu ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi 2=3  (12)
1 þ 12:7 ðfGni =8Þ Pr  1 Prw tional time. First, the geometric and optical properties of the PTC
are introduced to calculate the optical efficiency and the absorbed
with fGni ¼ ð1:82 logðReÞ  1:64Þ2 . solar radiation flux. The boundary conditions are then defined by
If the flow is laminar the correlation of Hausen [39] for fixing the mass flow rate and inlet temperature. As per the thermal
isothermal tube is adopted. modeling, the temperature of the glass envelope and receiver are
guessed and re-corrected based on the previous energy balance
0:0668,Re,Pr,Dri =L equations. The fluid temperature is updated for each iteration
Nu ¼ 3:66 þ (13)
1 þ 0:04,ðRe,Pr,Dri =LÞ2=3 based on the new fluid and receiver wall temperatures. The itera-
tive process is repeated until a convergence of the glass tempera-
Hence the heat transfer coefficient can be determined from the ture with an absolute error less than ε ¼ 10-4. It must be noted that a
Nusselt number as relaxation factor is used to ensure the convergence of the numerical
solution.
Nu,kf
hc;f r ¼ (14) Once the temperatures are converged, the performance pa-
Dri rameters are evaluated in the post-processing stage. The useful
It is worth to mention that Reynolds number is evaluated ac- gain, thermal efficiency, and heat transfer coefficients are calcu-
cording to the mass flow rate, the internal diameter and the fluid lated and compared for different soiling conditions. Fig. 4 shows the
properties: flow chart of the general algorithm used in the numerical model.
The present numerical model was validated with the experi-
4,m_ mental data from Sandia [33] for vacuum condition and cermet
Re ¼ (15) selective coating. The working fluid is synthetic oil (Syltherm 800)
p,Dri ,m
for which the thermophysical properties are correlated to poly-
Once the useful thermal energy is determined, the thermal ef- nomial functions versus temperature [42] as shown in Table 4.
ficiency can be calculated as Six cases were simulated and compared with the test results as
shown in Table 5. The comparison of the outlet fluid temperature
Q_ u shows an absolute error in the range of 0.67e1.25 K, with an
hth ¼ (16)
DNI,Aa average relative error less than 1%. The absolute error in thermal
efficiency is between 0.04 and 2.2% with an average relative error
less than 1.5%. Considering the uncertainty in both numerical and
4. Solution methodology and model validation experimental results, there is a good agreement between the pro-
posed model and test results especially for the HTF outlet tem-
The numerical procedure adopted in this work is based on perature. In addition to the good proximity to the experimental
solving the energy balance equations in an iterative way to deter- results, the proposed model presents the advantage of simplicity
mine the final temperatures of each components of the PTC. This and low computational cost.
268 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

Fig. 4. Flow chart of the general algorithm.

 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276 269

Table 4
Thermophysical properties of the heat transfer fluid (Syltherm800).

Fluid Properties a þb $ T(K)þc $ T2(K)þd $ T3(K)þe $ T4(K)

a b c d e

r (kg/m ) 3
1.105702 $ 10 3
4.153495 $ 10 -1
6.061657 $ 10 -4
0.0 0.0
Cp (J/kg.K) 1.107798 $ 103 1.708 0.0 0.0 0.0
k (W/m.K) 1.900210 $ 10-1 1.875266 $ 10-4 5.753496 $ 10-10 0.0 0.0
m (Pa.s) 8.486612 $ 10-2 5.541277 $ 10-4 1.388285 $ 10-6 1.566003 $ 10-9 6.672331 $ 10-13

Table 5
Validation of the numerical model with study cases from Ref. [33].

DNI (W/m2) _ (kg/s)

m DT ¼ Tin-Tamb (K) Tout, exp (K) Tout,num (K) Error (K) hth,exp (%) hth,num(%) Error (%) Est Error (%)

Case 1 933.7 0.68 91.9 397.15 395.90 1.25 72.51 73.93 1.43 1.95
Case 2 968.2 0.65 139.75 446.45 445.51 0.93 70.9 73.10 2.20 1.92
Case 3 982.3 0.63 184.2 492.65 491.91 0.73 70.17 72.03 1.86 1.81
Case 4 909.5 0.66 233.85 542.55 541.81 0.73 70.25 70.20 0.04 1.9
Case 5 937.9 0.62 278.55 590.05 589.37 0.67 67.98 68.23 0.26 1.86
Case 6 903.2 0.57 334.1 647.15 646.41 0.74 63.82 63.65 0.16 2.36

5. Results and discussion
The present study is focused on the evaluation of dust effect on
CSP performance under UAE conditions. In order to achieve this
objective, numerical and experimental investigations were carried
out at University of Sharjah, UAE. In the first place, the dust
chemistry was characterized using appropriate techniques to
determine the size and morphology of the dust samples. Outdoor
experiments were also performed to determine the reflectance of
CSP mirrors under real soiling conditions for different months. The
results of the experimental investigations are then used to estimate
the variation of the CSP efficiencies with dust and other weather
conditions. Finally, a comparison of the PV and CSP power loss was
performed for the same study period.
5.1. Dust characterization
The collected dust from the rooftop of the University of Sharjah
was subject of a characterization analysis in order to analyze its size
distribution and chemical composition. Dust particles were scan-
ned using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) test to study their
morphology characterizations. Fig. 5a shows that the dust particles
have different sizes and an irregular distribution. The diameter of
the dust particles was found to be in the range of (1.61e38.40) mm.
The elemental composition of the dust sample was analyzed
using a coupled Energy-Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS) to
obtain a localized elemental analysis of the sample. Fig. 5b depicts
the EDS results which show that oxygen is the dominant element
with an average of 46.1% followed by carbon 20.3%, calcium 10.5%
and silicon 10.2%.
Furthermore, the elemental chemistry of the dust sample and
relative concentrations are measured using X-Ray Fluorescence
(XRF) analysis. The results of the major mineral composition of the
dust sample show that SiO2, CaO and Fe2O3 are the dominant
minerals in the tested sample as illustrated in Fig. 5c.
Understanding the interaction between accumulated dust par-
ticles and the incident solar radiation has an important impact in
predicting the effective energy loss. In fact, dust accumulation on
solar mirrors leads to absorption and scattering of light and a
reduction in the reflective surface area [43]. Scattering is the pri-
mary effect of dust on reflector surfaces rather than absorption [1].
It is associated with a considerable reduction in specular reflection
and an increase in diffuse reflection. According to Ref. [44], the
optical effects of each of the particular contaminants is determined
by the optical properties, quantity, size and shape of the accumu-
lated particles. It is then concluded that smaller particle sizes such
as those with diameters within (0.3e2) mm possess the greatest
potential for optical loss. Moreover, the mineralogical composition
of the dust is important to understand the sticking effect and select
the appropriate cleaning method.
5.2. Soiling effect on different inclination angles and orientations
During the operation period of CSP systems, the inclination
angle and orientation of the solar collector are important factors
that can affect the rate of dust accumulation on the exposed mir-
rors. Mirror orientation during the exposure period may affect the
particle size and distribution of accumulated particles [44]. To
study the effect of these parameters on soiling rate, a set of nine
mirrors inclined with 0
, 25
and 90
with respect to the horizontal
and facing different orientations were exposed to UAE weather in
the second week of October. As shown in Fig. 6, the solar weighted
specular reflectance increased as the inclination angle increased
due to the gravity, which helps the dust particles to fall down. The
mirrors oriented to the North West (NW) direction followed by the
South East (SE) direction were affected more than the ones facing
the other orientations. It was found that the soiling loss of the solar
weighted specular reflectivity is about 28.5% and 28.24% for 25

NW and 25
SE mirrors respectively. According to IEM website
which collects environmental data for different sites, the wind is
mainly coming from the NW and SE directions with high wind
speeds from the NW compared to the other directions as shown in
Fig. 7 for Sharjah city. The wind blowing with high speed could
carry more dust and therefore cause more drop in reflectivity [45].
Although the dust accumulation rate is higher for newly exposed
clean mirrors [46], a longer exposure is more recommended to
better understand the interaction between the wind characteristics
and the dust settlement on the mirror surface [47].
5.3. Monthly soiling effect on the CSP performance
The monthly dust accumulation was investigated for five
consecutive months (February, March, April, May and June) by
placing the CSP mirrors under outdoor conditions. The mirrors
270 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

Fig. 5. Dust characterization tests: a) SEM b) EDS and c) XRF for dust sample.

were titled to 25
and oriented towards the south. At the end of
each month, a manual cleaning was performed to restore the
reflectivity. Using the same procedure detailed in section 2, the
solar weighted specular reflectivity was determined for the studied
months. Fig. 8 illustrates the monthly variation of the specular
reflectivity measured with the reflectometer and the calculated
solar weighted specular reflectivity. The relative reflectivity drop
was varying from 47% to 64% depending on the accumulated dust
and the influence of weather conditions. The lowest reflectivity was
recorded in month of March (around 30%) corresponding to relative
decrease of 64% respect to clean mirrors. This is probably due to the
high relative humidity at this month which contributes to
strengthen the adhesion of the dust particles on the mirror surface.
Rainfall was also observed in other months (February, April and
May) which acts as natural cleaning event for the mirrors and could
help reduce the soiling loss.
To evaluate the CSP performance degradation due to the
reflectivity drop, numerical simulations were carried out consid-
ering the climatic conditions. The simulations were performed on
the LS2 PTC using the experimental results of the solar weighted
specular reflectivity. In all these simulations, the engineering pa-
rameters are fixed according to Table 3. Fig. 9 shows the variation of
the monthly useful energy for both clean and dusty CSP mirrors.
It is obvious that the useful energy is higher for clean mirrors
but also it depends on the combinations of climatic conditions. In
case of the clean mirrors, the useful energy is sensitive to the DNI
values and incident angle modifiers. For instance, DNI is higher in
month of February compared to March but the incident angle

Fig. 6. Solar weighted specular reflectivity for different inclined mirrors facing different directions.
 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276
Fig. 7. Wind rose speed distribution for Sharjah city.
modifier is much higher in March resulting in higher useful energy.
The highest useful energy was observed during the month of May
(156 kWh/m2) where the ratio of DNI to the day length is the
highest as well as for the incident angle modifier. The useful energy
for dusty mirrors follows the same trend as the clean mirrors with
the exception that it decreases in month of March. This decrease is
Fig. 8. Monthly specular reflectivity.
271
attributed to the low specular reflectivity observed at the end of
this month. In addition, the monthly thermal efficiency is depicted
in Fig. 10 for both clean and dusty CSP mirrors.
The thermal efficiency is given as the ratio of the useful energy
to the total direct radiation intercepted by the PTC aperture
(Equation (16)). It is shown in Fig. 10 that the thermal efficiency of
the clean mirrors is increased during the studied period with the
highest efficiency recorded in month of June around 64.5%. The
efficiency of dusty panels was also increased with the exception of
month March which has the lowest reflectivity and highest drop in
optical performance. It is clear that the dust particles have a major
contribution in the deterioration of the PTC performance with a
drop in thermal efficiency varying from 26.4% (in February) and 36%
(in March). The thermal efficiency is also affected with the other
climatic conditions such as wind, humidity and ambient tempera-
ture. Additionally, these factors can play an important role in the
dust removal or settlement in the CSP mirrors. Wind for instance
can be an obstacle for the thermal efficiency as it cools down the
heat collector element, but it can help in cleaning the CSP mirrors
for adequate magnitude and direction.
5.4. Cumulative dust effect on CSP performance
As discussed in the previous sections, dust particles result into
severe reflection losses of CSP mirrors and thereby decreases the
energy yield of these solar plants. In order to evaluate the effect of
accumulated dust on the CSP performance, sample of mirrors were
placed outdoor without any cleaning for more than 3 months (from
21st January 18 to 15th April 18). Fig. 11 shows the soiling loss of the
solar weighted specular reflectivity of CSP mirrors which increased
up to 63% at the end of the test period. The main parameter affected
in the reflectivity measurement is the specular reflectivity which
decreases significantly with dust accumulation. High concentration
272 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

Fig. 9. Monthly useful energy for both clean and dusty CSP mirrors.

systems are extremely sensitive to scattering as well as to absorp- the reason that weather conditions including wind speed, humidity
tion since the beam radiations pass through the dust layer twice and rainfall directly influence the soiling rate and so the optical
[44]. Soiling loss due to scattering and absorption is not constant for properties of solar systems. A rainfall was recorded in 25th February

Fig. 10. Monthly thermal efficiency for both clean and dusty CSP mirrors.
 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276
Fig. 11. Measured Sw specular reflectivity loss for accumulated dust experiment.
causing a drop in the soiling loss. A monthly high relative humidity
reaching 56% was recorded in March leading to high adhesion
forces between the mirror surface and dust particles, which in turn
decreases the mirrors reflectivity as discussed in section 5.3. It is
worth pointing out that the hemispherical and specular reflectance
measurements were stopped after 15th April because the reflec-
tometer device started giving very low readings.
Using the cumulative soiling results, simulations were per-
formed to quantify the impact of the reflection losses on the CSP
performance. The measured values of the solar weighted specular
reflectivity were monthly averaged for the simulations.
Fig. 12. Comparison of different heat fluxes of both clean (clear pattern) and dusty (hatched pattern) CSP systems during three month of dust accumulation.
273
Fig. 12 shows the variation of the useful energy and the break-
down of the losses occurring during the same period of time for
both clean and dusty CSP system. It is clearly shown that the optical
losses are the most important ones in all cases which may alter the
CSP performance especially under dust conditions. Compared to
the clean mirrors, the soiling effect leads to an increase of the op-
tical losses and a significant drop of the useful energy for all
months. In addition to the dust accumulation, the monthly useful
energy for dusty mirrors is also sensitive to other optical errors
(incident angle) and DNI levels. For instance, the computed useful
energy for the month of April is slightly higher than March
although the dust was accumulated. This is mainly explained with
the increase of the DNI and the incident angle modifier during
April.
Similarly, soiling causes considerable transmission losses in
photovoltaic systems which decreases their performance. As
described in section 2, the dust effect on a PV system was also
investigated for the same exposure period at the same location
(University of Sharjah). Dust was accumulated on the top surface of
a PV module, and power measurements were taken on a weekly
basis. The reader is referred to Ref. [30] for more details on the dust
experiment with the PV system. Fig. 13 shows the comparison of
the monthly averaged power loss for both PV and CSP systems.
It is clearly observed that the soiling effect on CSP performance
is more serious than PV systems for the studied months. In fact, the
power soiling loss for CSP is 3e5 times worse than PV in the studied
period which requires higher cleaning frequency to maintain the
performance within an acceptable range. Such difference is justi-
fied with the higher reflection losses and the interaction of the dust
particles with the solar rays in its double trajectory through the
glass mirror [44,48]. It is also worthy to mention that the PV per-
formance is also affected with other weather conditions during the
test, which may interact with the dust settlement on the PV surface.
274 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276

Fig. 13. Power soiling loss for PV and CSP systems during the studied period.

6. Conclusion pronounced for CSP systems with 3e5 times more losses compared
to PV systems. This conclusion is consistent with the interaction
This paper contributes to one of the key challenging issues in between the dust particles and the light path and presents evidence
operating CSP systems in UAE and similar weather conditions. Both that more cleaning is required to restore the reflectivity of the CSP
experimental and numerical investigations are performed to un- mirrors.
derstand the effect of soiling on the CSP performance under real
operating conditions. The dust sample was first characterized to Acknowledgement
identify the morphology and size of the particles settled on the top
of the glass mirrors. The solar weighted specular reflectivity is This research work was supported by University of Sharjah and
obtained under different orientations and tilt angles. A good cor- Sharjah Electricity and Water Authority (SEWA) under the external
relation was found between the wind direction and the dust research project No. 1702040683-P. The authors are grateful to the
accumulation on different orientations. Monthly specular reflec- support of the X-ray Center for Material Analysis and Photovoltaic
tivity was measured for an exposure period of 5 months with laboratory at University of Sharjah in conducting this work. The
monthly cleaning. It is shown that solar weighted specular reflec- assistance of Deema Emadaldin and Zainab Al Hashimi is also
tivity was minimum during the month of March with more than appreciated.
50% drop compared to clean mirrors. Accumulated dust experiment
was also carried out in parallel and considerable reduction of
Nomenclature
specular reflectivity was observed after three months of exposure.
It should be noted that various climatic conditions can contribute to
more adhesion of dust particles on the glass surface. On the other
hand, numerical simulations were carried out to determine the Roman letters
power soiling loss of a CSP system based on the measured specular A Area [m2]
reflectivity. After validation with experimental results from litera- Cp Specific heat capacity [J/kg.K]
ture, the numerical model was used to predict the optical and D Diameter [m]
thermal performances in both monthly and accumulated dust ex- DNI Direct Normal Irradiance [kWh/m2]
periments. The results show that the thermal efficiency decreased f Friction factor
due to soiling in all the months with the maximum decrease of 36% h Convection heat transfer coefficient [W/m2.
C]
in March. In addition to dust effect, it is observed that the useful k Thermal conductivity [W/m.K]
energy of the CSP system could be affected with the incident angle K Incident angle modifier
modifier and DNI levels. However, the results of the accumulated L Length [m]
show that soiling is the major cause of the decrease of performance m_ Mass flow rate [kg/s]
which was clearly seen in the optical losses. Finally, power soiling Nu Nusselt number
loss was compared between CSP and PV systems under the same Pr Prandtl number
conditions. The comparison reveals that soiling effect is more Q Heat flux [kWh/m2]
Q_ Power [W]
 A.A. Hachicha et al. / Renewable Energy 143 (2019) 263e276 275

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