Carbon-based Nanofluid Applications in Solar Thermal Energy

Abstract

Renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and geothermal are proposed as an alternative to fossil fuels whose excessive use causes global warming. The most popular one of the renewable energy sources is considered as solar energy due to the fact that required energy is provided by the sun entire year around the world. Solar energy systems convert the solar radiation to the useful heat or electricity. In order to achieve better performance in solar thermal systems many studies have been conducted. Some of these studies suggest that heat transfer fluid could be changed with the nanofluids which can be defined as new generation heat transfer fluid. Nanofluids are suspensions of nano-sized particles such as metals, metal-oxides, and Carbon-allotropes (C), in the conventional base-fluids (water, ethylene glycol and oil). Using nanofluid enhances the efficiency and thermal performance of solar systems due to their better thermophysical and optical properties. Recently, C-based nanofluids are getting attention due to their enhanced thermal conductivity and absorptivity at even low concentrations. The results show that C-based nanofluids have a potential to use in solar energy systems: solar collectors, solar stills, photovoltaic/thermal systems.

Experimental investigation on the influence of nanofluids used as heat transfer fluid in phase change material based thermal energy storage system

“…Gupta et al [24] investigated on Al 2 O 3 water nanofluids and their flow rates on the efficiency of conventional solar collectors and enhanced efficiencies of more than 8% in comparison to pure water. Cobanoglu et al [25] studied on the utilization of nanofluids in solar thermal applications. They concluded that by the utilization of the carbon-based nanofluids enhanced the efficiency of the system.…”