Experimental study of the effect of soil type on global warming using laboratory thermal collector

Among the causes of global warming, figure the modification of the nature of the soil. This paper presents an experimental study of the effect of soil type on global warming using a laboratory thermal collector. This paper shows also another application of this experimental apparatus used generally for parametric study in order to improve its efficiency. The experimental device (ET200) used in this study consists of a thermal collector and water reservoir. The thermal collector receives solar energy from a halogen lamp (which simulates solar radiation) on its glass surface. The same amount of the following materials is spread over the receptive surface of the thermal collector; agricultural soil, local regional soil (soil of the region where these experiments were performed), cement and plaster. The same experimental conditions are kept up for each material used as receptive surface cover. The incident heat flux is influenced by the nature of the receptive surface coverage. Indeed, the receptive surface covered by agricultural soil and local soil receives the same incident flux. This flux is reduced by 4% in case of cement and 8% in case of plaster (i.e; relative to flux received by agricultural soil and local soil). The reception glass covered with agricultural soil transmits better the energy received from the lamp to the heating medium (heat transfer fluid); this energy is lessened by 9% in the case of local soil, by 27% in the case of plaster and 18% in the case of cement. So, the incident solar radiation is well reflected by the plaster, it is less reflected by the cement and it is the least reflected in the case of agricultural soil and local soil. So, the thermal collector demonstrates that air temperature is affected by the nature of the soil. It is recommended to preserve agricultural lands and do not transforming them into urban areas in order to reduce the effect of global warming. (C) 2017 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.