What is Solar Thermal Energy ?

This is the technology and methods to harness the solar power for the purpose of producing
electrical energy or heating in industrial and the daily use.

Difference b/w Solar Thermal energyand Solar PV Energy Conversion

•
Solar PV Energy is the direct conversion of solar radiant energy intoelectrical energy.
•
It uses the photovoltaic effect . This happens due excitation of theelectron and hole pairs
when the light falls on it.
•
It is a direct method of energy conversion.
•
Solar Thermal energy is indirect method of power conversion.
•
It is used to heat up some fluid to generate mechanical power which inturn produces
electricity.
History of Solar Thermal Energy Conversion
•
Early efforts involved heating the water for daily use.
•
People used black painted boxes to trap solar heat to heat up the water.
•
Klerence Kemp designed the world’s first commercial solar water heater.
•
.
•
Frank Shuman (1897) demonstrated a solar engine that worked by reflecting solar energy
onto boxes to power a toy engine.
•
Shuman built the world’s first solar thermal power station in Maadi,Egyptto operate
pump connected to Nile(1912-1913).
•
The solar energy lost its popularity to availability of cheap coal, oil and non availability of
copper due to war.
Classification of Solar Thermal Energy
According to the achievable temperature , the solar thermal energy is classified as:
Low temperature Solar Collectors
•
T<100 C
Medium Temperature Solar Collectors
•
1OO C to 300 C
High Temperature Solar Collectors
•
Above 300 C
Low Temperature Solar Collectors
•
Low temperature solar collectors use non concentrated light.
•
These are used in water and space heating applications.
•
They may be glazed or unglazed i.e. covered with or without glass sheet.
Low temperature heat collectors have the following types:
•
Flat Plate Collectors
•
Evacuated Solar Collectors
Flat Plate Collectors
These are the simplest type of solar collectors. These have the followingparts :
1. A dark flat plate absorber2. A transparent cover that reduces heat loss(glass
or polycarbonate)3. A heat transport fluid to remove heat from the absorber4. A heat
insulating backing
Types of Flat Plate Collectors
•
Harp type solar collectors
•
Serpentine type
•
Flooded Absorber
Harp type collectors have a harp type shape with a number of pipes running across the
length of the collector.
•
In serpentine type, A continuous ‘S’ maximizes the temperature of the water.
But it is bit lesser efficient than Harp type due to the pressure loss that occurs in the pipe.
•
Flooded Absorber type solar collector two layers of metal sheets stamped together to
provide larger area of heat exchange with a marginal boost in the efficiency.
•
Used in residential and district heating system where it may prevent excessive cost of
heating.
•
Flat plate collectors have a peak power output of 1.7 KW for an area of 2.26square m with a
nominal flow rate of about 1.6 L/min

Evacuated Tube Collectors

•
Evacuated tube heat collectors use air and vacuum as the insulating material.
•
Evacuated glass tube prevents conduction as well as convection.
•
The vacuum in the tubes can be maintained for about 25 years. Due to its nsulation
characteristics, it is the most efficient of all the low temp. solar collectors.
Solar Air Heaters
•
Transfer heat to the air by convection to the surface.
•
It is also used in domestic space heating
•
Solar air heat is also used in process applications such as drying laundry, crops(i.e. tea, corn,
coffee) and other drying applications
•
They are easy to build but they are not as efficient as water heat collectors andthus require a
large area for the required heats.
Medium Temperature Solar Heat Collectors
•
These collectors produce higher temperatures than the low temperature solar collectors.
•
These are used in drying wood for construction and wood chips as a fuel.
•
These collectors are also used for cooking as Solar Cooker.
•
These collectors are also used to distil the water in places where drinking water is not
easily available. These devices are called solar still.
Solar cooker
Solar cooker has the following types:
•
Box or Flat Panel Type Solar Cooker
•
Parabolic Solar Coo

Flat Panel Solar Cooker

A box cooker has a transparent glass or plastic top
•
it may have additional reflectors to concentrate sunlight into the box
•
One or more reflectors of shiny metal or foil-lined material may bepositioned to bounce
extra light into the interior of the oven chamber
•
The box should have insulated sides.
•
Cooking containers and the inside bottom of the cooker should bedark-colored or black.
•
The solar box cooker typically reaches a temperature of 150°C (300°F)and takes
longer time to cook.

Parabolic solar cooker

It is axially symmetrical and shaped so its cross-section is a parabola.

•
The food is kept at its focus for maximum temperature.
•
High-performance parabolic solar cookers can attain temperatures above 290 °C (550 °F).
•
They can be used to, stir-fry vegetables, make soup, bake bread, and boil water in minutes.
Advantages and Limitations of Solar Cooker
•
Solar cookers use no fuel. This saves cost.
•
No environmental damage as compared to conventional fuels. Since they are used outside,
they do not contribute inside heat, potentially saving cooling costs.
•
No evaporation of oil, vapours in the atmosphere. Thus cleaner cooking.
•
Solar cookers are less useful in cloudy weather and near the poles.
•
Some solar cookers, especially solar ovens, take longer to cook food than a conventional
stove or oven.
•
Some solar cooker designs are affected by strong winds, which can slow the cooking
process
High Temperature Solar Collectors
•
High temperature solar collectors like mirrors and lenses are used to concentrate a large
amount of solar energy to small area to produce heat thereby producing electricity or
high temperature heat.
•
This is achieved by the concentrating a large amount solar power with the help of
concentrating collectors.
•
The temperatures may reach above 500 C.
•
The technologies using concentrated solar power are :
1.Parabolic Trough
2.Dish Sterling
3.Solar Power Tower
4.Fresnel Reflector
Parabolic Trough
•
Parabolic trough is a type of solar thermal collector that is straight in one dimension and
curved as a parabola in the other two.
•
A Dewar tube, which runs the length of the trough at its focal line, acquires heat
from it.

The mirror is oriented so that sunlight which it reflects is concentrated on the tube, which
contains a fluid which is heated to a high temperature
•
Usually aligned on a north-south axis
•
Thermal oil runs through the tube to absorb the concentrated sunlight
•
The overall efficiency conversion is 15 % and the maximum temperatures are about 400C
Following are the components of Parabolic trough:
•
Collector: is essentially a parabolic mirror or reflector used to concentrate light on the single
point made of borosilicate glass or polymer lined with silver
•
Bearing structure: To carry wind loads and weight of concentrator
•
Receiver

Dish Sterling

Dish stirling is a solar powered stirling engine which receives its input
power from the concentrated heat of the dish.
The Stirling Energy Systems (SES), United Sun Systems (USS) and
ScienceApplications International Corporation (SAIC) dishes at UNLV, and Australian
National University's Big Dish in Canberra, Australia are representative of thist echnology.
•
Two solar parks using the Stirling Energy Systems or SES systems, are currently
being developed in US with a capacity of 1.4GW.
It has the following components
•
The concentrator : It is not single parabolic dish as it is difficult to manufacture and
assemble, this engine used about 12 separate mirrors mounted on the dish. The material is
usually glass but fibre resins are also used.
•
Tracking system: Tracking system works such that there is never a shadow over the
concentrator, which reduces the collector efficiency. Thus it has a two axial tracking system.
•
Horizontal and vertical movement of the concentrator are actuated with the help of
servomotors.
•
Receiver: The receiver is the link between the concentrator and the stirling
engine. Itis of two types. Solar only receiver which only operates during the daytime and
the other is the gas burner type, to provide power in the night.
•
The rest of the part is the stirling engine.
Solar PowerTower
•
The solar power tower, also known as 'central tower' power plants or 'heliostat' power plants
or power towers, is a type of solar furnace using a tower to receive the focused sunlight.
•
It uses an array of flat, movable mirrors (called heliostats) to focus the sun's rays upon a
collector tower (the target)
This focused energy is used to generate steam to drive the turbine toproduce electricity.
•
It is often coupled with a thermal energy storage system to store the heatenergy. This energy
can be used in night time to produce power.
•
The Planta Solar 10 (PS10) in Sanlucar la Mayor, Spain, the
377MWIvanpahSolar Power Facility, located in the Mojave Desert are
commercialsolar power tower plants
•
National Solar Thermal Test Facility, NSTTF (6MW) located in
Albuquerque,NM, is an experimental solar thermal test facility
Parts of solar power tower:
The collector system (CS) : It contains the collector field and heliostats that redirect and
focuses sunlight on the receiver. The major system elements are two-axis tracking mirrors
•
The receiver : It is a cylindrical tube wall heat exchanger that heats molten rate salt from
290°C (550°F) to 565°C (1050°F)
•
Thermal Salt Storage: It stores high temperature nitrate salt 565°C (1050°F) from the
receiver for use by the steam generator, and stores low temperature nitrate salt 290°C
(550°F) from the steam generator for use by the receiver
•
The Steam Generation System (SGS) uses thermal energy from the hot nitratesalt to
produce superheated steam.

Fresnel Reflector
•
Linear Fresnel reflectors use long, thin segments of mirrors to focus sunlight on to a fixed
absorber located at a common focal point of the reflectors.
•
These mirrors are capable of concentrating the sun’s energy to approximately
30times its normal intensity.
•
Multiple absorbers can be used in the improved Compact Fresnel Reflector technology.
•
AREVA Solar (Ausra) has finished construction of the 5MW KimberlinaSolar
Thermal Energy Plant in Bakersfield, California.
•
In March 2009, the German company NovatecBiosol constructed a Fresnel solar
power plant known as PE1(1.4 MW).