Experimental and Numerical Analysis of Heat Transfer in Grooved Tubes for Solar Collector Applications

Solar thermal energy research and utilization is progressing rapidly since it is clean energy and can achieve carbon credits in developed and developing countries. The energy conversion efficiency of most of the solar collectors is low, as much of the energy absorbed by collectors is lost due to transient atmospheric conditions. Reduction of losses and improving the performance of collectors by providing economical solutions has been the greatest challenge that scientists are facing even today. Material technology has achieved highest boundaries in all the applied fields ranging from medical to space. According to literature, the use of nanofluids in thermal devices improves the performance thereby further increasing the thermal conversion efficiency of solar collectors. The work here aims at numerically and experimentally studying the heat transfer enhancement obtained as a result of introducing grooved tube collector and using ZnO nanofluid as the working media in a solar flat plate collector. Helical g...