DESIGN AND EXPERIMENTAL ANALYSIS OF SOLAR PARABOLIC TROUGH COLLECTOR SYSTEM – A NOVEL WAY TO TRAP THERMAL ENERGY FOR EFFICIENT COOKING

Abstract

Human civilization has been witnessing a gradual shifttowards cleaner fuels-from wood to coal, from coal to oil,from oil to natural gas; renewables are the present demand.The present work reports the design, construction andexperimental testing of a Solar Parabolic Trough Collector(SPTC) System for efficient cooking to reduce the cost ofthermal energy. The light energy from the sun is reflectingby reflective sheet in the parabolic trough solar collector.Then it is absorbed by evacuated tube called as absorberwhich is placed at the focal line of the SPTC. Water ispassed to the tube from reservoir through the water hosetube. Inside the evacuated tube, water is starting to boil andconverted to steam by continuous focus of reflecting mirrorby tracking mechanism. Further, the generated steam is sentto the cooking tank using a separate pipe line. Preliminarytest results show that the overall performance of the solarthermal cooker is satisfactory. The SPTC is capable ofcooking 3.0 kg of rice within 60 to 90 minutes, and variousingredients within maximum of 45 minutes at peak hours ofsun. From the test result and the collector performance, theworking model is seen fairly acceptable for thermal energyusage in cooking processes. Physical output indicates that,by using envelope Evacuated Tube Absorber (ETA) inSPTC; high quality steam can be produced for efficientcooking of rice, dhal, vegetables and eggs, etc.