Optical and thermal evaluations of a medium temperature parabolic trough solar collector used in a cooling installation

Concentrated solar power technology constitute an interesting option to meet a part of future energy demand, especially when considering the high levels of solar radiation and clearness index that are available particularly in Tunisia. In this work, we study a medium temperature parabolic trough solar collector used to drive a cooling installation located at the Center of Researches and Energy Technologies (CRTEn, Bordj-Cedria, Tunisia). Optical evaluations of the collectors using photogrammetric techniques were performed. The analysis and readjustments of the optical results were conducted using a Matlab code. Therefore, slope errors ranged from −3 to +27 milliradian and the height deviations from the ideal shapes of the parabolic trough collector were 2.5 mm in average with a maximum of 7.5 mm. The intercept factor was determined using both the method of the total optical errors and the camera target method leading respectively to 0.62 and 0.7. Thus, the values of the overall optical efficiency were 0.48 and 0.514. Conversely, a thermal performance testing of the parabolic trough collector was conducted leading to the thermal efficiency and the heat losses evaluations. The instantaneous thermal efficiency reached a maximum of 0.43 but it did not exceed the value of 0.30 when the reflector becomes dirty by dust deposition. This study was also an opportunity for suggesting some recommendations for the enhancement of the PTC performances.