Energy and exergy comparison of a flat-plate solar collector using water, Al2O3 nanofluid, and CuO nanofluid

By Y. Tong, Hoseong Lee, Woobin Kang, Honghyun Cho. Applied Thermal Engineering, 2019

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Abstract The performance of a flat-plate solar collector was investigated by using water, Al2O3 nanofluid, and CuO nanofluid as the working fluids. The energy efficiency, entropy generation, exergy destruction, and exergy efficiency were analyzed and compared. The flat-plate solar collector exhibited the highest efficiency when the Al2O3 nanofluid was used as the working fluid (21.9% higher than the efficiency when water was used). The entropy generation was the highest for water and the lowest for 1.0 vol%-Al2O3 nanofluid. The exergy efficiency of the solar collector using 1.0 vol%-Al2O3 and 0.5 vol%-CuO nanofluid was improved by 56.9% and 49.6%, respectively, compared with that for water. The highest exergy efficiency of the solar collector was obtained with 1.0 vol%-Al2O3 nanofluid. Experimental results showed that the use of Al2O3 and CuO nanofluids in the flat-plate solar collector could improve the thermal efficiency compared to the use of water, and the maximum performance of the flat-plate solar collector was obtained when 1.0 vol%-Al2O3 nanofluid was used.

Subfields: Biomedical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9a3a1e6828f5a5b28e27d0b7278443ea5afa38c8