SOLAIR – Innovative solar collectors for efficient and cost-effective solar thermal power generation

• Research unit: SFOE
• Project number: 102327

Key words (English)

TP0065;CSP;ST;F-Industrielle Solarenergienutzung

Short description (German)

SolAir - Innovative solar collectors for efficient and cost-effective solar thermal power generation

Final report (English)

This report presents the main results of the project. The project has been started at the end of 2007 and has been successfully finished in December 2008. The present project of ALE AirLight Energy aims at the engineering investigation and design of a novel concept of a solar collector system for efficient and cost-effective solar thermal power generation. The technology exploits an air-inflated reflective structure for concentrating solar radiation. This new arrangement reduces investment costs of the collector field and promises to be economic competitive. A first prototype, built in 2007, has been redesigned and heavily modified during this project. In the new configuration, by using secondary mirrors, the focal area is located close to the main structure and allows the integration of the receiver in the inflated structure. The topics expanded in this document are as follows: • Design solutions for the concentrated energy receiver suitable for the revised SolAir concentrator concept. • Solar flux simulation via Monte Carlo method. • New version of the ALE AirLight Energy concentrator prototype. • Prototype radiative flux measurements.

Auftragnehmer/Contractant/Contraente/Contractor:
ALE Airlight Energy SA

Autorschaft/Auteurs/Autori/Authors:
Barbato,M.C.
Haueter,Ph.
Bader,R.
Steinfeld,A.
Pedretti,A.

Related documents

• SolAir | Innovative Solar Collectors for Efficient and Cost-Effective Solar Thermal Power Generation - Rapport Final [PDF] 4'234 kB