Numerical and experimental analysis of the thermo-structural optimization and design evolution of a multipurpose solar cooking stove
摘要
The development of effective and sustainable cooking solutions is essential for addressing global issues of energy consumption and environmental impact. The objective of the present work is to provide a comprehensive cooking solution for a single rural household of western India. A Scheffler-type solar concentrator-based cooking system is conceptualized for the above requirement due to its unique feature of stationary receiver. Prime attributes of the proposed system are stationary cooking place, purely thermosiphon-based system and low cost which makes this suitable for rural applications. The proposed system consists of a Scheffler dish operated stove (rectangular box of 55 cm × 35 cm × 20 cm) having two customized vessels, viz. cooking vessel 2.5-L capacity and a cooking pan(griddle) of 25 cm diameter Made of SS 304 and cast iron, respectively. ‘Shell Thermia “S2”’ is used as a HEAT TRANSFER FLUID (HTF) to carry the heat from the receiver to the stove, and its flow is completely through by the thermosiphon effect. As no external pumping device is used for the HTF flow, fluid velocity (discharge) plays a major role in design of the system. Based on the mathematical model developed, the approximate thermosiphon flow rate comes out to be 0.80 L min⁻1 or 2.63 cm s−1 for a pipe diameter of 1 inch. To check thermosiphoning and thermal feasibility of the system, CFD analysis was done for four different configurations to find the optimum configuration using ANSYS Fluent. After finalizing the design, a prototype experimental setup of cooking stove was developed and tested using an induction heater to ensure proper thermosiphon of HTF and boiling process in the cooking vessels. Experimental results showed close resemblance to the simulation results of thermosiphon for a thermosiphon height of 0.63 m.