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A study of solar chimney coupled to spiral heat exchanger

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 A study of solar chimney coupled to spiral heat
exchanger

Dhahri. A., Omri. A., Orfi. J.

Research Unit: Materials, Energy and Renewable Energies, Department of Mechanical Engineering, King Saud
University of Gafsa, Sciences Faculty 2112 Gafsa,Tunisia University, P.O. Box 800, Riyadh, 11421, KSA
[email protected]

Schlaich, and with funding from the German Ministry research

Abstract— This work is devoted to characterize the and technology [1, 2]. The solar chimney is characterized by a
performance of a solar chimney coupled to a geothermal heat
195 high chimney with a constant diameter of 10 m. the solar
exchanger during night periods. This system generally consists
of four known devices such as the collector, the tower collector area extended to a radius of 120 m from the chimney
(chimney), the turbine and the heating system. The energy with the glazing being 1.85 m above the ground. The turbine is
behavior of heating equipment constructed of in-plane spiral housed at the base of the chimney [3].
coil tubes was discussed. A tridimensional steady state The operation of such a plant is strongly dependent on the
numerical study was performed using the CFD software amount of solar radiation. The main disadvantage of this
FLUENT. The developed numerical model was used to assess system that it cannot operate continuously during night. For
the effect of the heating system parameters on the solar this reason, many studies suggested different solutions to
chimney night operation. The results show that: increasing guarantee a continuous operation during night hours such as:
radius overnight reduces the collector air exit velocity; the
The use of the ground under the collector as energy storage
heat flow through the collector and air exit velocity are highly
dependent on the heat exchanger operating conditions; the layer [4-8], the usage of closed water-filled tanks [9-11], the
exchanger geometrical dimensions (coil pitch and tube use of water bags [12] and the heat extraction from salt
diameter) have a major impact on heat flow through the gradient solar ponds [13]. Other few studies suggested the use
collector. In addition, beyond a radius of 80 m, collector heat of geothermal water tubes as heating equipment [14,15]. The
losses increase notably. authors indicated that introducing geothermal water makes
greater contribution and can achieve a 24 hours-operation.
Since a lack of works on the combination of solar chimney
Keywords—solar chimney, FLUENT, exchanger, spiral; night, with geothermal heating device during night has been
geothermal. detected, the present work proposed to place an auxiliary
heating system constructed of in-plane spiral coil tubes above
I. INTRODUCTION the ground. In order to evaluate the effect of this proposition
on the solar chimney performance, a 3D numerical study was
With the alarming rate of depletion of the major conventional performed in the current work based on the Manzanares
energy resources coupled with the environmental degradation (Spain) prototype as a reference.
caused by the process of harnessing these energy sources, it
has become an urgent necessity to invest in renewable energy
that would power the future sufficiently without degrading the II. SYSTEM DESCRIPTION AND BASIC PRINCIPLE
environment through green house gas emission. The
renewable energy such as solar and geothermal energy have A. Description of the heating system
for a long time been the primary possibility of generating
The heating system above the ground is composed of poly-
energy. Renewable energy technologies constitute a new field
circular tube arranged on the collector floor allows by
of knowledge and research. A well balanced mix of these
exploiting the heat from the geothermal water to heat the air
energy sources can secure the energy supply in the less
entering from the periphery of the collector. This system is
developed countries and even replace conventional energy
connected to a main supply reservoir placed near the location
electricity. In the last years, an exciting innovation called solar
of the geothermal well. The exploited well is located in the
chimney has been introduced and has been successfully
center of the chimney. The radius of the reservoir is equal to
demonstrated by experimental and numerical studies.
15 m.The space between turns was fixed at 0.2 m. The
This system which is suitable to be applied in arid and semi-
distribution of heat is considered uniform, leading to neglect
arid areas is an advanced way to generate electricity from
local heating heterogeneities along the radius of collector.
solar radiation. The first solar chimney prototype was actually
The operation of a spiral heat exchanger is simple. The air
built and tested in Manzanares (Spanish town 150 kilometers
flows from the periphery (outermost turn) to the center of the
from Madrid) under the direction of German engineer Jörg
collector. Water enters the inner turn located in the center of T air,i air temperature across the i-th turn, °C
the collector with a hot temperature and exit at the end of the T air,i+1 air temperature across the i+1-th turn, °C
spiral tube with a cooler temperature. Thus, the mode of m air air mass flow rate, kg/s
circulation of the two fluids (air and water) is cross flow. Main
dimensions and characteristics of the spiral exchanger are m w water mass flow rate, kg/s
summarized in Table 1. Ui overall heat transfer coefficient, W/m2.K
x distance along tube, m
TABLE I. MAIN DIMENSIONS m  wC p ,w Tair ,i  Tw,i   Exp  i   1 (7)
 air C p,air Tair ,i  Tair ,i 1   m
Description Value Unit
Tube diameter 0.2 m The approach considered in this section is to separate the
Water flowrate 85.6 Kg/s geothermal heat exchanger in a sufficient number of portions.
Pitch between tow turns 0.2 m
The water temperature along a plane spiral coil tube (T w, i+1) is
Inner radius 5 m
Outer radius 120 m calculated iteratively from the temperature in the preceding
Turn number 92 turn (T w, i), the air temperature in the vicinity of the coil, and
Inlet water temperature 70 °C the heat flow rate on the preceding turn (fig. 1). In order to
determine the heat transported by geothermal water to the
In the case of in-plane spiral coil tube, the problem is collector indoor air, the water outlet temperature needs to be
complex because the outlet temperatures vary depending on the known. For this reason, an iterative calculation based on (6)
position of the fluid in the exchanger. The calculation of output and (7) must be able to give this temperature at the exit of
temperature is ensured by the equations below. each turn. The inlet temperature is known.
Equations of energy are developed for a turn of the coil. In the
theoretical model, each turn of the heat exchanger is assumed
to be a linear spiral. The radius of the coil at the inlet and outlet
are denoted Ri and R0. α represents the rate of change of the
radius [16,17].
In addition, each full rotation (2π) is approximately
considered circular. The mean radius of i-th turn, Rmi, is given
by:

Rmi  R0   2i  1 (1)

The outside heat transfer area (Ai) of i-th turn is expressed

as follow:
Ai  2 Rmi A0 (2)
Fig. 1. Descriptive diagram of a spiral exchanger.
Where A0 is the heat transfer area per unit tube length.
The energy balance for a small control volume in i-th turn The amount of heat transported by the hot water along the
is given by: pipe is evaluated by:
 wC p, wdTw  Ui A0 Tair  Tw  x  dx
m (3)  eau C p ,eau Teau ,e  Teau ,s 
Q geoth  m (8)
The integration of (3) leads to the expression:
Tair ,i  Tw,i 1  Tair ,i  Tw,i   Exp  i  (4)
B. Basic principle
Where The conventional solar chimney is characterized by a tall
central chimney surrounded at its base by a circular
i i   mwC p ,w 
i   AU  (5) greenhouse consisting of a transparent cover supported a few
meters above the ground by a meal frame (fig. 2). Sunlight
The overall energy balance equation to the i-th turn leads passing through the transparent cover causes the air trapped in
to: the greenhouse to heat up by 10 to 20°C.The hot air rises (hot
air being less dense and thus lighter than cold) up the chimney
tower thereby supplying a natural convective force. It is
 wC p,w Tw,i  Tw,i 1   m
m  air C p,air Tair ,i  Tair ,i 1  (6) replenished by fresh air drawn in at the periphery of the
greenhouse. The energy contained in the updraft air is
Where converted into mechanical energy by the turbine located at the
Cp, air specific heat capacity of air, J/kg K base of the chimney and then into electrical energy by
Cp, w specific heat capacity of water, J/kg K generators.
 Since southern Tunisia is characterized by hot water to the strong pressure gradient in the transition section, we
sources with temperatures ranging from 65 to 80° C [18], the needed to use fine tetrahedral grids in this part while for the
heat supply by geothermal energy can overcome the deficits of other parts we applied hexahedral mesh. An inlet pressure
sunshine. In the absence of solar radiation (during night boundary condition type was specified at the collector inlet. At
hours), the process of the hybrid system (fig. 3) works in this the chimney exit a pressure outlet boundary condition was
way: Warm water pumped from the reservoir goes directly selected. Non-slip conditions are imposed on the walls. The
through pipes placed above the ground under the collector chimney walls are considered to be adiabatic.
roof. The exploited geothermal well is located in the center of
the chimney. The heat exchanger supply heat to the indoor air The numerical simulation of turbulent flow is performed for
in the collector zone. The water cools down due to the heat 3D case of a solar chimney power plant. During the
exchange process that occurs with the indoor air. The hot air simulation, the conservation equations for mass, momentum
migrates from the solar collector to chimney bottom and rises and energy were selected and solved numerically using the
to the top of the chimney. finite volume method [19]. During simulation, the turbulence
model k-ɛ standard was used. The SIMPLE algorithm is used
to solve the coupling between pressure and velocity. Pressure
interpolation was done using the PRESTO method. The model
was solved with a standard second order upwind discretization
scheme. The discrete ordinates method (DO) was used to
calculate the radiation heat transfer. A numerical solution is
assumed converged when the residuals of the continuity
equation, momentum equation and velocity components
become smaller than 10-3. For the energy equation and the
discrete ordinate equation the convergence criterion should be
under 10-6. The thermo-physical properties of the fluid are
assumed constant except the density (Boussinesq
approximation is assumed to be valid). The grid independence
Fig. 2. Conventional Solar chimney power plant scheme. test indicates that the total appropriate cell number is about
1228452 cells [20].

IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In the current work, we perform a parametric study to identify the
important variables that affect the performance of a geothermal-
solar chimney during night. The mathematical model was
successfully validated through comparison with experimental data
from the Manzanares plant and numerical results available in the
literature [20].

A. Effect of the collector radius

Fig. 4 indicates the effect of different collector radius (40, 60,
80, 100, 120 and 140 m) on the air exit velocity.
Fig. 3. Schematic diagram of a solar chimney coupled with a 2,5
spiral exchanger.
2,0
III. NUMERICAL APPROACH AND BOUNDARY CONDITIONS
Air velocity (m/s)

Due to the fact that the Manzanares chimney was the first 1,5
successful experimental prototype in the world, published
numerical investigations have considered the main dimensions
of studied models similar to those of the Spanish prototype. 1,0
The system geometry consists of a chimney with 195 m height
and 5 m radius surrounded by a collector with 120 m radius 0,5
and 1.85 m height [1]. The chimney and the collector are
separated by a transition section where it is placed a turbine
0,0
driven by the updraft. 40 60 80 100 120 140
The physical domain was modeled and meshed using the pre- Radius (m)
processor GAMBIT. The computational domain was
decomposed into three simple parts (collector, transition
section and tower) whose mesh was generated separately. Due Fig. 4. Air velocity variation against collector radius.
A constant water temperature equal to 70 °C was considered. effect of centrifugal force (due to the curvature of the tube).
The results presented in fig. 4 are derived from an analysis This leads ultimately to the reduction of the secondary flow
carried out with a total water flow rate of 85.6 kg /s. These (Dean Effect) for largest coil diameter. The intensity of the
results highlight a marked influence of the collector radius. secondary flow developed in the tube is a function of its
After various numerical tests, it was found that the air velocity diameter and the coil diameter [21-24].
at the outlet of the collector drop significantly as the radius
increases.
10900

B. Coil pitch effect 10800

Heat flow rate (kW)

The pitch between consecutive turns plays an essential role on
the design of spiral heat exchangers. Tests were carried out to 10700
study the effect of the pitch between consecutive turns on the
amount of heat exchanged between the geothermal water and 10600
air flowing in the collector (fig. 5).
10500
10950
10900 10400

10850 0,2 0,4 0,6 0,8 1,0

Heat flow rate (kW)

10800 Tube diameter(m)

10750
10700 Fig. 6. Effect of tube diameter on the heat flow rate variation.
10650
10600
10550 D. Water flow rate effect
0,2 0,4 0,6 0,8 1,0 In order to examine the effect of geothermal water flow rate
Coil pitch (m)
on heat transfer performance of the heating system, fig. 7
displays the variation of the amount of heat as a function of the
water flow along the spiral coil tube. For a constant collector
Fig. 5. Variation of heat flow rate against the coil pitch. radius (120 m) and a given geothermal water temperature
(70°C), the water flow rate was varied from 85.6 to 214 kg/s.
We chose to vary the pitch between 0.2 and 1 m. Note that
increasing the pitch leads to a reduction of the number of turns
2,0
which varies from 92 to 19. As observed in the fig. 5, for a 26000
Heat flow rate
pitch ranging from 0.2 to 0.4 m, increasing the pitch causes 24000 Air Velocity
the increase in heat flow rate. Beyond these values, the 1,5
22000
increase in the pitch will result in a lower amount of heat. The
Heat flow rate (kW)

Air velocity (m/s)

20000
calculated data show clearly the influence of the pitch
variation on the functioning of the spiral heat exchanger. So 18000 1,0
maintaining a constant pitch is one of the key parameters that 16000
guarantee a good performance. In addition, it is necessary to 14000 0,5
maintain a sufficient distance between the tubes so that air can 12000
circulate easily between the turns.
10000
0,0
80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220
C. Tube diameter effect Water flow rate (kg/s)

The fig. 6 illustrates the variation of the amount of heat

transferred from hot water vs. the tube diameter. The tests are
carried out by varying the diameter from 0.2 to 1 m. In this Fig. 7. Effect of water flow rate.
section, the water flow rate, the coil pitch and the size of the
collector are maintained at fixed values. It can be seen that the
increase in tube diameter can significantly affect the rate of
heat transferred to the internal air. For a diameter value less As expected, we can notice in fig. 7 that it is advantageous
than 0.4 m, the heating capacity increases. It is interesting to to increase the total flow of geothermal water. All calculations
note that beyond this value, the heat flow recovered from the were made with the same geometrical parameters of
hot water decreases. This may be due to the reduction of the Manzanares prototype. Seven tests were performed by varying
the flow rate with an increment of 21.4 kg/s. The higher the
water flow rate, the greater the amount of heat recovered by the 4000
air passing through the collector. The fig. 7 also confirms that it
is preferable to increase the water inlet flow rate to obtain 3000
higher air velocities.
2000

Heat losses (kW)

E. Water inlet temperature effect 1000
In order to judge the effect of water inlet temperature on 0
heat flow rate, the numerical tests are performed at a specific
water flow rate (85.6 kg/s) and for a water temperature ranging -1000
from 55 to 75 ° C.
-2000

-3000
13000
40 60 80 100 120 140
12000 Radius (m)

11000
Heat flux (kW)

Fig. 9. Collector heat losses as a function of radius.

10000

9000
V. CONCLUSION
8000 A computational study was conducted to examine the night
operation of a solar chimney combined to a geothermal heat
7000 exchanger. The use of geothermal water is an advantageous
55 60 65 70 75
solution due to its ability to ensure a continuous operation of
Water inlet temperature (°C) the plant by fulfilling the nocturnal power demand. This work
has identified the parameters affecting the system performance
overnight. The Analysis of the combined system behavior leads
Fig. 8. Heat flow rate as a function of radius. to the following findings:
- The air exit velocity at night depends strongly on the
size of the collector.
Geometric dimensions of this case were set the same as
those of Manzanares prototype. Fig. 8 shows a net increase of - The use of geothermal energy may improve the
the geothermal power. In addition, this figure indicates that the operation of the solar chimney overnight.
difference between the quantities of heat supplied by the heat
exchanger can reach 12.38% on average. It can be concluded - The geometrical dimensions of the heating device
that the more the operating temperatures and input flow rate are (coil pitch and tube diameter) have a prominent
well chosen, the more efficiently the geothermal heat impact on the heat transfer process.
exchanger will operate. - The heat transfer rate absorbed by the indoor air is
highly dependent on the exchanger operating
F. Collector heat losses conditions (inlet temperature and water flow rate).
To evaluate the effect of radius on heat dissipation rate in the The higher these parameters, the greater the air
collector, the radius was varying from 40 to 140 m. For a value velocity at the exit of the collector.
less than 80 m, any increase of the radius leads to the increase - Heat losses through the collector cover increase
of the collector energy losses (fig. 9). In the case of a radius notably once the collector radius is beyond 80 m. for a
equal to 100 m, the lower energy losses are mainly due to the radius exceeding 120 m, a temperature inversion
decrease of convective losses in the outer surface of the cover. phenomenon appears and convective exchange from
Exceeding 120 m, the temperature of indoor air is lower than the cover to the outside air in the opposite direction is
the outside air. A temperature inversion appears and convective observed.
exchange from the cover to the outside air in the opposite
direction is observed. This phenomenon occurs because
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