Solar Cooker Study under Oman Conditions for Late Evening Cooking Using Stearic Acid and Acetanilide as PCM Materials

Abstract

Solar energy is an alternative source of nonrenewable energy in Oman. Sultanate of Oman government showed initiation into utilization of solar energy for domestic applications. Conversion of solar radiation into useful heat is the simplest application of solar energy, in which it can be used for late evening cooking. In this context, present work highlighted the design and development of solar cooker for Oman climatic conditions. The current work signifies usage of solar cooker for late evening cooking using stearic acid and acetanilide as phase change materials (PCM). Solar cooker parts are developed in-house and connected to water heating system compounded with evacuated tubes solar collector and storage tank. The circumference of cooker unit is incorporated with spiral stainless steel heat exchanger and annulus area of the pot is filled with PCM material. PCM releases heat at late evening and effective cooking up to 7:30 PM is noticed. The experimental results indicated the cooker efficiency of 30% and collector efficiency of 60-65% during the study. Overall, experiments showed satisfactory performance on the developed cooker.

Design, Construction, and Evaluation of the Performance of Dual-Axis Sun Trucker Parabolic Solar Cooker and Comparison of Cooker

“…To solve the above problem, in addition to energy conservation, researchers started to study more about alternative energy resources such as solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, tidal, and biomass, which are commonly called renewable energy [14][15][16][17]. ese energy sources are clean and environmentally friendly.…”

Storage and heat utilisation efficiencies of two solar storage cooking pots using different cooking loads

“…A cheaper and more affordable option is to integrate the storage system into the cooking pot as reported in recent work [7][8][9][10][11][12][13]. Chaudhary et al [7] performed experiments on a storage receiver for a parabolic dish solar cooker using acetanilide as the phase change material (PCM).…”

“…The storage cooking pot cooked dinner and could retain enough heat for breakfast cooking. Nayak et al [11] presented a solar storage pot charged with an evacuated tube collector. Two PCMs were used in the study namely; acetanilide and stearic acid.…”

Performance comparison of two solar cooking storage pots combined with wonderbag slow cookers for off-sunshine cooking

“…The results obtained demonstrated that the PCM could absorb solar radiation throughout daytime periods and use the heat in evening cooking. Nayak et al, (2016) experimentally investigated acetanilide and stearic acid as PCMs for a storage cooking pot charged up with an evacuated tube solar collector. The circumference of the cooker was integrated with a heat exchanger, and the annulus area of the cooking unit was embedded with PCMs.…”