Comparative study on the performance of tilted compound parabolic concentrator (CPC) and V-Trough concentrator via open-source ray-tracing

Comparative analysis on the optical performance of tilted Compound Parabolic Concentrator (CPC) and V-Trough solar concentrator with particular emphasis on optical efficiency, Local Concentration Ratio (LCR), and heat flux distribution has been performed and reported in this work. Simulation of the concentrators was carried out in Tonatiuh open source ray tracing software. The absorber of the concentrators was tilted by an angle of 17.5° from horizontal which closely aligns with the local latitude of Visakhapatnam (17.6°N, 83.2°E), India. The performance of both the concentrators across a wide range of incidence angles (-60° to + 60°) and concentration ratios (1.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0) and truncation percentage (20 to 80%) has been examined. Concentration ratio (CR) of 1.5 was found to be optimal for both the concentrators due to reasonable acceptance angle, optical efficiency and practical structural stability for fabrication. Effect of 20, 40, 60 and 80% truncation in both the concentrators with an initial constant concentration ratio of 1.5 has also been investigated. At 60° incidence angle, truncated CPC achieved an optical efficiency of 26% whereas, the truncated V-trough concentrator demonstrated 40% optical efficiency. These findings revealed that 80% truncation in V-Trough concentrator, enhanced acceptance angle and reduced the number of reflections leading to uniform heat flux distribution over the tilted absorber. Hence, truncated V-Trough concentrator can be considered an effective concentrator for low concentration PV module application to achieve uniform heat flux distribution and relatively high optical efficiency over a wide range of incidence angles.