Design, Simulation and Manufacturing of an Integrated Composite Material Parabolic Trough Solar Collector

摘要

Design, simulation, and manufacturing process of an integrated thermal photovoltaic closedparabolic collector (ITPVCPC) using composite material is presented in this paper. The design includestwo flanges for supporting photovoltaic panels. Two cases of troughs were designed and studied, one withglass cover over the aperture area and another without it in order to investigate the structure rigidity andsolar ray collection in the absorber tube. Three-dimensional modelling and structural finite elementanalysis (FEA) based simulation was done for the design. In the simulation, the ITPVCPC structure wassubjected to the upper limits of wind pressure and temperature-rise loadings similar to the real workingconditions. Optical analysis was done for the trough to study the effect of structure deformation on solarray collection. The glass covered ITPVCPC showed higher structure deformation than the one withoutglass. Glass fiber with polyester resin was used in the manufacture of ITPVCPC for its low pricecompared to other composite materials. The study shows that glass fiber (with polyester matrix) is anideal composite material for ITPVCPC for its high rigidity, low cost, and ease of manufacture. Thisdesign is successfully implemented and is the source of thermal and electrical power for a solardesalination system installed in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.