A study on dynamic heating in solar dish concentrators

In recent years there has been a growing interest in renewable energy sources due to the increasing prices and the possible exhaustion of the current commercial energy reserves. The use of sunlight as an energy source offers a huge number of long-term benefits in widely varied and flexible applications. In the present work, the behavior of the temporal temperature in a specimen placed on the focal point of a parabolic dish solar concentrator was predicted, and a dimension quantity (Omega) was proposed. This parameter (Omega) correlates the diameter of the solar collector (D) with the solid mass to be heated (M) and the rate of solar irradiance (G). The behavior of the Equilibrium Temperature as a function of Omega was also investigated. Simulations were carried out by manipulating D, M and G, and they were arranged according to a full factorial design. The simulation results obtained showed that temperatures up to 1,600 degrees C can be achieved in relatively short periods of time, and they also indicated that the solar concentrator studied in this work can be an alternative to provide thermal energy for high temperature applications. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.