Development of the Investigation of Solar Updraft Tower in the City of Erbil to the North of Iraq
Abstract
This work is the result of more than ten years of research in solar tower power plant that has led to five international publications in this field. The investigation started with the work on developing a relation between the size of the components, so that when the system is designed, a more feasible outcome can be achieved. In the next stage the collector area limitations were studied and for that purpose the capacity of the collector was reduced to one third and the sides were sealed in a rig that was built for this purpose. The loss of thermal volume due to a smaller collector was compensated in the next stage by introducing thermal concentration with the help of a sun tracking mirror that reflected the solar thermal radiation on the tower base. The work was partially hindered when the School Administration decided to destroy the rig. Fortunately, sufficient data was collected to finish this stage. In the next stage a simulation model was developed to look into the ability of such a device to adapt to alpine terrain which is an attribute of local landscape. The model was verified and used to run a parametric study. The system performance was compatible but lower than the conventional flat configuration. In the final stage a turbine was designed for the system using a different airfoil profile. The model was verified but could not be integrated into the simulation for the whole system. The misgivings of the reverse fan model were outlined when compared to the turbine. The reverse fan model was assembled into the developed sloped collector solar tower model and used to investigate the performance of the overall system. The system was functional with reduced capacity.
Keywords
Solar, Updraft tower, Geometry, Thermal concentration, Sloped collector, Turbine