An investigation on the usage of different supercritical fluids in parabolic trough solar collector

Hafiz Aman Zaharil

Renewable Energy, 2021, vol. 168, issue C, 676-691

Abstract: The temperature limitation of thermal oil which limits the overall efficiency of a thermodynamic cycle has propelled the study of the usage of supercritical fluid in parabolic trough solar collector (PTSC) due to its ability to operate at higher temperature levels. sC02 is the most popular supercritical fluid currently studied in PTSC, but there are some other supercritical fluids have been used in industrial applications yet rarely studied in PTSC. In this research, the performance of three different supercritical fluids namely, water (sH2O), nitrogen (sN2),Sulphur hexafluoride (sSF6) along with carbon dioxide (sCO2) was studied and compared. A 1-D mathematical model was developed, validated, and it was solved by the commercial software EES. The results showed that the energetic performance of water is superior to the rest of the fluids at common inlet temperatures with sN2 showing comparable performance to sCO2 and sSF6 showing consistently weaker performance than the rest. The exergetic performance of these fluids showed that sH2O and sSF6 are promising alternatives to sCO2. All fluids showed maximum exergetic efficiency at an inlet temperature of 750K with the respective maximum for sH2O, sSF6, sCO2 and sN2 of 46.46%, 46.24%, 46.11% and 45.76%. Comparison of these supercritical fluids to Therminol VP-1 and molten salts also showed promising potential. H2O is the best supercritical fluid for usage in thermal storage at 650K where it has thermal storage energy density (TSED) of around 165% higher than the highest value of molten salt’s TSED.

Keywords: Parabolic trough; Solar energy; Energy; Exergy; Supercritical fluid; Heat transfer fluid (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:renene:v:168:y:2021:i:c:p:676-691

DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2020.12.090

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