4E assessment of power generation systems for a mobile house in emergency condition using solar energy: a case study

In this study, a solar parabolic trough concentrator (PTC) was evaluated as a heat source of a power generation system based on energy (E1), exergy (E2), environmental (E3), and economic (E4) analyses. Various configurations of power generation systems were investigated, including the solar SRC (SRC) and solar ORC (ORC). Water and R113 were used as heat transfer fluids of SRC and ORC system, respectively. It should be mentioned that the proposed solar systems were evaluated for providing the required power of a mobile house in an emergency condition such as an earthquake that was happened in Kermanshah, Iran, in 2016 with many homeless people. The PTC system was optically and thermally investigated based on sensitivity analysis. The optimized PTC system was assumed as a heat source of the RC with two various configurations for power generation. Then, the solar RC systems were investigated based on 4E analyses for providing the power of the mobile house based on various numbers of solar RC units. It was concluded that the solar SRC system could be recommended for achieving the highest 4E performance. The highest value of its energy efficiency was found at 24.60% and of his exergy at 26.37%. On the other hand, the ORC system has energy and exergy efficiencies at 17.64% and 18.91%, respectively, which are significantly lower than the efficiencies of the SRC system. The optimum heat source temperature for the SRC system is found at 650 K, while for the ORC system at 499 K. Moreover, the best economic performance was found with the SRC system with a payback period of 7.47 years. Finally, the CO2 mitigated per annum (φCO2) was estimated at 5.29 (tones year−1), and the carbon credit (ZCO2) was calculated equal to 76.71 ($ year−1)

Hybrid optimization algorithm for thermal analysis in a solar parabolic trough collector based on nanofluid

In recent years, many research works focused on improving and reducing the cost of solar collectors. This paper focuses upon the development of an efficient modeling and optimization of solar collector. The approach adopted in modeling utilizes a parabolic trough collector absorber tube with non-uniform heat flux, fully developed mixed convection flow and Al2O3/synthetic oil as a base fluid. Optimization of thermal analysis in a solar trough collector using nanofluid is non-convex, non-linear and computationally intensive process. In order to overcome these difficulties, a hybrid optimization method involving GA (genetic algorithm) and SQP (sequential quadratic programming) is introduced in the optimization process. The optimization problem used in this study involves maximization of a nondimensional correlation consisting of Nusselt number and pressure drop with Reynolds and Richardson number which are used as design constraints. The methodology implemented within an integrated environment involving Matlab, Gambit and Fluent. The results obtained show that heat transfer enhancement has a direct relationship with the nanoparticle concentration ratio whereas it has inverse relationship with the operational temperature. In addition, the results show that the proposed methodology provides an effective way of solving thermal analysis in a solar parabolic trough collectors based on simulation models