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Experimental and numerical investigation of a solar thermocline system for domestic water heating applications

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Abstract

Solar energy is one of the major sources of renewable energy and is being extensively harnessed. However, the intermittent nature limits solar energy to act as a stand-alone energy source. Therefore, it becomes imperative that effective and economical methods of storing solar energy on a large scale are developed. Both sensible and latent heat storage methods are available. The use of a thermal energy storage (TES) system is an attractive choice for high-temperature applications such as power generation plants. The present study investigates the development of a small-scale TES system using a concentrated solar collector. For this purpose, a small cylindrical thermocline tank with suspended copper pipes in the storage medium was developed, with vegetable oil working as the heat transfer fluid (HTF) and being circulated through the pipes to transfer heat to used engine oil as the storage medium. A pump continuously circulates the HTF through the charging loop. TES was designed and developed based on the results of numerical simulations before the physical development of the experimental setup. Numerical calculations were performed for determining heat transfer and charging characteristics using different heat storage materials. The numerical results showed that a maximum temperature of 67 °C was achieved in the 100-min simulation while in the experimental results, a maximum temperature of 64 °C was achieved. The experimental results were found in close conformance with the simulation results. The experiments showed that the flow rate of 0.088 L s−1 was optimal and provided the highest temperature in the thermocline tank. The discharging experiment showed that the apparatus is viable to be used for 5.5 h for heating purposes. The salient feature of the study is an inexpensive TES system development and can act as a benchmark for the future development of renewable technology.

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Abbreviations

\(\dot{m}\) :

Mass flow rate (kg s−1)

\({C}_{\text{p(water)}}\) :

Specific heat capacity of water (J kg−1K−1)

\({C}_{\text{p(HTF)}}\) :

Specific heat capacity of heat transfer fluid (J kg−1 K−1)

\(\Delta T\) :

Temperature difference (K)

\({E}_{\text{req(steam)}}\) :

Energy required for steam generation during discharging (MJ)

\({E}_{\text{req(HTF)}}\) :

Energy required to be provided by HTF for charging (MJ)

\({E}_{\text{req(storage)}}\) :

Energy required to be stored in storage medium (MJ)

\({\text{Density}}_{\text{(storage)}}\) :

Density of the storage medium (sand) (kg m−3)

\({\text{Volume}}_{\text{(storage)}}\) :

Volume of the storage medium (m3)

V r :

Radial velocity (m s−1)

V θ :

Tangential velocities (m s−1)

V z :

Axial velocities (m s−1)

g :

Acceleration due to gravity (m s−2)

V :

Kinematic viscosity of the fluid (m2 s−1)

ρ :

Fluid’s density (kg m−3)

\({C}_{\text{pf}}\) :

Specific heat of the working fluid (J kg−1 K−1)

\({T}_{\text{f}}\) :

Fluid temperature (K)

\({k}_{\text{f}}\) :

Thermal conductivity of fluid (W m−1 K−1)

\({k}_{\text{s}}\) :

Thermal conductivity of solid (W m−1 K−1)

\({T}_{\text{s}}\) :

Temperature of the solid domain (K)

TES:

Thermal energy storage

CSP:

Concentrated solar power

PCM:

Phase change material

CPC:

Compound parabolic collector

HTF:

Heat transfer fluid

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the support of the Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology, Topi, 23460, KPK, Pakistan, and its Interdisciplinary Engineering, Modelling and Simulation Research Group (IEMSRG) in carrying out the present research work.

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Author notes

  1. H. Yildizhan

    Present address: Clean Energy Processes (CEP) Laboratory, Department of Chemical Engineering,, Imperial College London, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology, Topi, 23460, Pakistan

    T. A. Cheema, H. Javaid, M. H. Tariq, M. T. Basharat & Z. M. Subhani

  2. Faculty of Engineering, Energy Systems Engineering, Adana Alparslan Turkes Science and Technology University, Adana, Turkey

    H. Yildizhan

  3. Biosystems Engineering Department, Faculty of Agriculture, Tarbiat Modares University (TMU), Tehran, Iran

    O. Fakhraei & S. Gorjian

  4. Shahrood University of Technology, Shahrood, Iran

    M. H. Ahmadi

  5. Clean Energy Processes (CEP) Laboratory, Department of Chemical Engineering,, Imperial College London, London, SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom

    C. Pandey

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Contributions

T A Cheema was contributed conceptualization and methodology. H Javaid was involved in numerical simulation and write up. H Yildizhan was performed data curation and analysis. M H Tariq did design of experiments. M T Basharat and Z M Subhani were done test setup development and experimentation. O Fakhraei was responsible for writing—original draft preparation and literature review. S Gorjian was attributed reviewing and editing. M H Ahmadi did investigation. C Pandey was done supervision.

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Correspondence to T. A. Cheema.

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Cheema, T.A., Javaid, H., Yildizhan, H. et al. Experimental and numerical investigation of a solar thermocline system for domestic water heating applications. J Therm Anal Calorim (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10973-024-13148-x

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