SIMULATION OF FLOW-FIELD AND HEAT TRANSFER INSIDE THE RECEIVER FINNED TUBE OF A PARABOLIC TROUGH COLLECTOR

Solar energy becomes an alternative energy contribution towards a wide field of applications from medium to higher temperature levels. In this study, the application of internal fins (of different shapes) in a standard parabolic trough collector with gas as a working fluid is considered. Carbon dioxide (gas) is the working fluid, whereas Eurotrough ET-150 is the standard solar collector included in the work. The design and the simulation of gas flow and heat transfer in a solar collector are performed with the open-source softwares Salome and blueCFD-core (OpenFOAM and ParaView). The usage of internal fins attribute to increase in thermal efficiency with the drawback of significant pressure losses.