Drying of Tomato in a Photovoltaic and Thermal Solar-Powered Continuous Dryer

In this study, a solar energy dryer capacity of 10 kg has been designed, manufactured and analyzed by drying tomato. The developed dryer has been used to dry the tomatoes at the different conditions. The necessary electricity and heat energy was provided by solar energy completely. The tomatoes were sliced into 5 mm thickness were dried from initial moisture content 16.39 g water g dry matter^-1 to final moisture content 0.21 g water g dry matter^-1. Tomato slices were dried at 40 °C, 45 °C and 50 °C drying air temperatures and average 0.2 m s^-1 air velocity in 8.5, 7 and 6 hours, respectively. Specific moisture extraction rates (SMER) were calculated as at 40 °C 0.49 kg kWh-1, 45 °C 0.45 kg kWh^-1 and 50 °C 0.42 kg kWh^-1. Average solar collector efficiency was calculated as 49.33% according to experimental results. Keywords: Drying; Solar energy; Tomato; Energy analysis