Pitam Chandra

Uniformly illuminated absorber surface for parabolic reflectors

Abstract In view of the importance of uniform intensity of concentrated solar rays for photovoltaic energy conversion, an analytical solution has been determined for the absorber surface used with parabolic reflectors. The exact solution was determined by solving the non-linear differential equation through a finite difference approximation. The coefficient of the absorber surface radius vector, as obtained from the exact solution, was compared with an approximate analytical solution, and the maximum variation between the two solutions was found to be 1.13%. The equation for the uniformly illuminated absorber surface is in terms of the focal length of the parabola of the reflector and the concentration ratio, hence it can be used for any size and type of parabolic reflector. The reflector/absorber configurations for cylindrical parabolic and paraboloidal reflectors have also been described.