Direct Beam Solar Radiation Received by Parabolic Trough Collector with Dust Accumulated on Its Surface

Abstract

Dust accumulation was part of the natural phenomena that adversely affecting the performance of the parabolic trough solar system. The parabolic trough solar concentrator was exposed to the ambient conditions. In this paper, the work was investigated experimentally and mathematically the effect of sand dust accumulation on beam light reflectance at a trough concentrator surface. The optical efficiency of the solar concentrator was analyzed theoretically and dust accumulation condition was simulated in this paper, in order to study the effect of dust on the optical efficiency of the solar concentrator and energy flux distribution of the metal tube. Moreover, energy flux density was generated via the Monte Carlo ray tracing method and the finite element volume method from the discussion of the heat transfer of the parabolic trough collector system. The results showed that the dust accumulated condition effected obviously a reflection path of the light and the energy flux density wall of the metal tube wall surface, and because of the dust accumulation energy flux density distribution of the wall also had a certain influence on circumferential temperature distribution.