SIMULATION OF PARABOLIC TROUGH COLLECTOR PERFORMANCE (TAPCOP)

What is the Performance of a Parabolic Trough Solar collector In warming a heal transfer fluid used in solar thermal power plants. Probably, this is the most important question being pursued here. This type of collector is com only used in the existing solar power plants. Concentrating collector intercepts and focuses solar rays on a linear focal line in order to transform the focused energy into thermal energy. This paper introduces efficiently a precise mathematical model for parabolic trough collector, and analytically, the effects of important parameters on such collectors are studied. The variation of receiver outlet -temperature as well as collector thermal efficiency in relation to changes in those parameters are investigated. This model is composed of a parabolic concentrator, a secondary concentrator on a receiver protection tube and a radiation protection tube. Solar rays intercepted by the parabolic mirror are reflected on a receiver tube mounted at the focal fine of the trough. As a result the concentrated energy through receiver wall is conducted to a circulating heal transfer fluid and afterwards t hrough several beat exchanging stage the collected energy is given up to produce superheated steam needed for power plant steam cycle. To harvest more solar energy, a collector must trace sun in a way to have rays landed perpendicularly on its surface. System geometry, variation of ambient temperature and also wind velocity, Air mass and beat transfer fluid type are all incorporated in this model. Therefore in this paper, with use of a computer program named TAPCOP the thermal performance of parabolic trough solar collectors is simulated and analyzed.