 Sand-propylene glycol-water nanofluids for improved solar energy collectionS. Manikandan and K.S. Rajan Energy, 2016, vol. 113, issue C, 917-929 Abstract: Experiments were carried out on the preparation, thermophysical properties' measurement and application of surfactant-free, sand-propylene glycol-water nanofluids for solar energy collection. Thermal conductivity enhancement of 16.3% and viscosity reduction of 47% were observed for 2 vol % sand-PG-water nanofluid at 28 °C. Microconvection caused by Brownian motion was identified as one of the mechanisms of thermal conductivity enhancement. The relative viscosity of sand-propylene glycol-water nanofluid was less than 1 over a temperature range of 10–60 °C and sand nanoparticle concentration range of 0.5–2 vol %. The lower viscosity of sand-PG-water nanofluids in comparison to that of propylene glycol-water mixture is attributed to non-covalent interactions between sand nanoparticles and propylene glycol, leading to perturbation of hydrogen bonding network. The use of 2 vol % sand-PG-water nanofluid resulted in enhancement of heat transfer and solar energy collection by 16.5%. Our results demonstrate that sand-PG-water nanofluids are suitable for use as heat transfer fluid in solar collectors. Keywords: Solar energy collection; Enhancement; Propylene glycol-water; Relative viscosity; Thermal conductivity ratio; Brownian motion (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:113:y:2016:i:c:p:917-929 DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2016.07.120 Access Statistics for this article Energy is currently edited by Henrik Lund and Mark J. Kaiser More articles in Energy from Elsevier |
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