An experimental study of solar thermal system with storage for domestic applications

Authors

  • M. Abid Center for Sustainable Technologies, Ulster University, Newtownabbey, BT37 0QB, United Kingdom
  • B. A. A. Yousef Sustainable and Renewable Energy Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE
  • M. E. Assad Sustainable and Renewable Energy Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE
  • A. Hepbasli Department of Energy Systems Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Yasar University, Bornova,35100 Izmir, Turkey
  • K. Saeed Department of Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering, King Saud University Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15282/jmes.12.4.2018.09.0355

Keywords:

Flat solar collector, Energy, Exergy, Improvement potential rate, Sustainability

Abstract

Building sector consumes a greater portion of energy for heating and cooling applications. The utilization of fossil fuels for space and water heating in buildings cause a negative effect on the environment by producing larger CO2. In this study solar thermal water heating system for building application have been analyzed from the first and second law perspectives of thermodynamics considering various scenarios and water consumption pattern. The solar flat collector is very commonly used to extract energy from sunlight. Therefor energy and exergy efficiency curves for the solar flat collector were presented. The energetic and exergetic values for the system were calculated based on the experimental values for the overall system, the heat exchanger and the pumps using the approach of exergetic product/fuel basis. The greatest and lowest relative irreversibility’s occurred at the solar collector and the heat exchanger with values of 85.73% and 2.45%, respectively, and the system overall exergy efficiency was determined to be 20.28%. The energy and exergy efficiencies of the solar collector were analyzed at three different cases depending on the mass flow rates in the solar collector and the secondary circuit of the system. Three different mass flow rates were applied to the inlet of the secondary circuit to observe the efficiency effect on the solar collector circuit. This study can assist in selecting a proper solar collector and storage size for buildings of various capacity and possible improvement in the design of the system components.

Author Biography

B. A. A. Yousef, Sustainable and Renewable Energy Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Sharjah, Sharjah, UAE

 

 

References

Aste N, Del Pero C, Adhikari RS, Marenzi G. Effectiveness and weaknesses of supporting policies for solar thermal systems—A case-study. Sustainable Cities and Society. 2015; 14: 146-53.

Gilani SE, Al-Kayiem HH, Woldemicheal DE. Effect of conical pin arrangement on heat transfer efficiency of a free convective solar air heater. Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Sciences (JMES). 2016; 10: 2053- 64.

Sansaniwal SK, Kumar M. Analysis of ginger drying inside a natural convection indirect solar dryer: An experimental study. Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Sciences (JMES). 2015; 9: 1671- 85.

Zambrana-Vasquez D, Aranda-Usón A, Zabalza-Bribián I, et al. Environmental assessment of domestic solar hot water systems: a case study in residential and hotel buildings. Journal of Cleaner Production. 2015; 88: 29-42.

Panaras G, Mathioulakis E, Belessiotis V. A method for the dynamic testing and evaluation of the performance of combined solar thermal heat pump hot water systems. Applied Energy. 2014; 114: 124-34.

Jafarkazemi F, Ahmadifard E. Energetic and exergetic evaluation of flat plate solar collectors. Renewable Energy. 2013; 56: 55-63.

Ge Z, Wang H, Wang H, Zhang S, Guan X. Exergy Analysis of Flat Plate Solar Collectors. Entropy. 2014; 16: 2549.

Koroneos C, Tsarouhis M. Exergy analysis and life cycle assessment of solar heating and cooling systems in the building environment. Journal of Cleaner Production. 2012; 32: 52-60.

Kashyap Y, Singh A, Raja Sekhar Y. Exergy Analysis of a Flat Plate Solar Collector With Grooved Absorber Tube Configuration Using Aqueous ZnO–Ethylene Glycol. Journal of Solar Energy Engineering. 2018; 140: 061011-10.

Moghadam H, Deymeh SM. Determination of optimum location and tilt angle of solar collector on the roof of buildings with regard to shadow of adjacent neighbors. Sustainable Cities and Society. 2015; 14: 215-22.

Greening B, Azapagic A. Domestic solar thermal water heating: A sustainable option for the UK? Renewable Energy. 2014; 63: 23-36.

Abdelghani-Idrissi MA, Khalfallaoui S, Seguin D, Vernières-Hassimi L, Leveneur S. Solar tracker for enhancement of the thermal efficiency of solar water heating system. Renewable Energy. 2018; 119: 79-94.

Wu W, Dai S, Liu Z, et al. Experimental study on the performance of a novel solar water heating system with and without PCM. Solar Energy. 2018; 171: 604-12.

Mahendran M, Lee GC, Sharma KV, Shahrani A, Bakar RA. Performance of evacuated tube solar collector using water-based titanium oxide nanofluid. Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Sciences (JMES) 2012; 3: 301-10.

Srinivasa RG, Sharma KV, Chary SP, et al. Experimental study on heat transfer coefficient and friction factor of Al2O3 nanofluid in a packed bed column. Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Sciences. 2011; 1: 1-15.

Tahseen M, Ishak, Rahman M. A numerical study of forced convection heat transfer over a series of flat tubes between parallel plates Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Sciences (JMES). 2012; 3: 271- 80.

Baneshi M, Bahreini SA. Impacts of hot water consumption pattern on optimum sizing and techno-economic aspects of residential hybrid solar water heating systems. Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments. 2018; 30: 139-49.

Eu Commission. An EU strategy on heating and cooling Commission of the European Communities, Brussels (2016) https://ec.europa.eu/energy/sites/ener/files/documents/1_EN_ACT_part1_v14.pdf, Accessed 24th October 2018.

Brandoni C, Shah N, Vorushylo I, Hewitt N. Poly-generation as a solution to address the energy challenge of an aging population. Energy Conversion and Management,. 2018; 171: 635-46.

Ceylan I. Energy and exergy analyses of a temperature controlled solar water heater. Energy and Building. 2012; 47: 630-5.

Duffie JA, Beckman WA. Solar Engineering of Thermal Process. . New York: Wiley, 1991.

Öztürk HH. Experimental determination of energy and exergy efficiency of the solar parabolic-cooker. Solar Energy. 2004; 77: 67-71.

Petela R. Exergy analysis of the solar cylindrical-parabolic cooker. Solar Energy. 2005; 79: 221-33.

Kotas TJ. The Exergy Method of Thermal Plant Analysis. UK.: Anchor Brendon Ltd., Tiptree, Essex, 1985.

Van Gool, W. Energy policy: Fairy tales and factualities. In: Innovation and Technology-Strategies and Policies, Soares, O. D. D., Martins da Cruz, A., Costa Pereira, G., Soares, I. M. R. T., and Reis, A. J. P. S, editors. Dordrecht: Kluwer. 93– 105, 1997.

Abid M, Hepbasli A. Dynamic Exergetic Analysis and Evaluation of Photovoltaic Modules. Energy Sources, Part A: Recovery, Utilization, and Environmental Effects. 2015; 37: 2271-84.

Downloads

Published

2018-12-27

How to Cite

[1]
M. Abid, B. A. A. Yousef, M. E. Assad, A. Hepbasli, and K. Saeed, “An experimental study of solar thermal system with storage for domestic applications”, J. Mech. Eng. Sci., vol. 12, no. 4, pp. 4098–4116, Dec. 2018.

Issue

Vol. 12 No. 4 (2018): (December 2018)

Section

Article

License

Copyright (c) 2018 The Author(s)

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

Similar Articles

<< < 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 > >> 

You may also start an advanced similarity search for this article.