University of Basra

Engineering college
Chemical engineering department

Report about:
(Solar Energy)

‫ هناء عصام محمد‬:‫االسم‬

62 :‫الرقم‬
‫ صباحي‬:‫نوع التعليم‬
‫ ثانية‬:‫المرحلة‬
1.Introduction to Solar Energy:
Energy produced and radiated by sun is known as
solar energy. This solar energy can be converted
directly or indirectly into other forms of energy
such as heat and electricity.
Now it has been proved that the solar energy can
be stored by either of these methods:

By producing hydrogen and storing it.

By storing it in mechanical or electrical devices.
By storing it in containers of chemicals called
eutectic or phase changing salts.

Most of the energy is received from the Sun in the

form of short wave radiations of light. When this
radiation strikes a solid or liquid, it gets absorbed
and transformed into heat energy. This heat
energy is either stored (warming the material) or
is conducted to the surrounding materials (air,
water etc.) or is re-radiated (in the form of a long
wave radiation) to the other material having
relatively lower temperature.

Glass possess very little interference to the

incoming solar energy i.e. it easily transmits short
wave radiation whereas it is a very poor
transmitter of long wave radiation i.e. once the
solar energy has passed through the glass and has
been absorbed by some material (black painted
surface) inner to it, then the heat will not be re-
radiated back, out of the glass (thus glass acts as a
heat trap).
This is the physical principle for the conversion of
solar energy into heat energy.

2.Applications of Solar Energy:

I. Solar Water Heating:
A solar water heating unit comprises a blackened
flat plate metal collector with an associated metal
tubing facing the general direction of the sun. The
plate collector has a transparent glass cover
above and a layer of thermal insulation beneath
it.
The metal tubing of the collector is connected by
a pipe to an insulated tank that stores hot water
during cloudy days. The collector absorbs solar
radiations and transfers the heat to the water
circulating through tubing either by gravity or by a
pump.
This hot water is supplied to the storage tank via
the associated metal tubing. This system of water
heating is commonly used in hotels, guest houses,
tourist bungalows, hospitals, canteens as well as
domestic and industrial units.

II. Solar Heating of Buildings:

Solar energy can be used for space heating of
buildings in many ways namely:
(a) Collecting the solar radiation by some element
of the building itself i.e. solar energy is admitted
directly into the building through large South-
facing windows.
(b) Using separate solar collectors which may heat
either water or air or storage devices which can
accumulate the collected solar energy for use at
night and during inclement days.
When the building requires heat then from these
collectors or storage devices, the heat is
transferred by conventional equipment such as
fans, ducts, air outlets, radiators and hot air
registers etc. to warm up the living spaces of a
building.
When the building does not require heat, the
heated air or water from the collector can be
moved to the heat storage device such as well
insulated water tank or other heat holding
material. For inclement days, an auxiliary heating
system using gas, oil or electricity is required as a
back-up system.

III. Solar-distillation:
In arid, semi-arid or coastal areas there is scarcity
of potable water. The abundant sunlight in these
areas can be used for converting saline water into
potable distilled water by the method of solar
distillation.
In this method, solar radiation is admitted
through a transparent air tight glass cover into a
shallow blackened basin containing saline water.
Solar radiation passes through the covers and is
absorbed and converted into heat in the
blackened surface causing the water to evaporate
from the brine (impure saline water). The vapors
produced get condensed to from purified water in
the cool interior of the roof.
The condensed water flows down the sloping roof
and is collected in the troughs placed at the
bottom and from there into a water storage tank
to supply potable distilled water in areas of
scarcity, in colleges, school science laboratories,
defense labs, petrol pumps, hospitals and
pharmaceutical industries.
Per liter distilled water cost obtained by this
system is cheaper than distilled water obtained by
other electrical energy-based processes.

IV. Solar Furnaces:

In a Solar furnace, high temperature is obtained
by concentrating the solar radiations onto a
specimen using a number of heliostats (turnable
mirrors) arranged on a sloping surface. The solar
furnace is used for studying the properties of
ceramics at extremely high temperatures above
the range measurable in laboratories with flames
and electric currents.
Heating can be accomplished without any
contamination and temperature can be easily
controlled by changing the position of the
material in focus. This is especially useful for
metallurgical and chemical operations.
 Various property measurements arc possible on
an open specimen. An important future
application of solar furnaces is the production of
nitric acid and fertilizers from air.

V. Solar Cooking:
A variety of fuel like coal, kerosene, cooking gas,
firewood dung cakes and agricultural wastes are
used for cooking purposes. Due to the energy
crisis, supply to these fuels are either
deteriorating (wood, coal, kerosene, cooking gas)
or are too precious to be wasted for cooking
purposes (cow dung can be better used as manure
for improving soil fertility).
This associated the used of solar energy for
cooking purposes and the development of solar
cookers.
A simple solar cooker is the flat plate box type
solar cooker. It consists of a well-insulated metal
or wooden box which is blackened from the inner
side. The solar radiations entering the box are of
short wavelength. As higher wavelength
radiations are unable to pass through the glass
covers, the re-radiations from the blackened
interior to outside the box through the two glass
covers is minimized, thereby minimizing the heat
loss.

The heat loss due to convection is minimized by

making the box airtight. This is achieved by
providing a rubber strip between the upper lid
and the box for minimizing the heat loss due to
conduction, the space between the blackened
tray and outer cover of the box is filled with an
insulating material like glass-wool, saw-dust,
paddy husk etc.

When placed in sunlight, the solar rays penetrate

the glass cover and are absorbed by the
blackened surface thereby resulting in an increase
in temperature inside the box. Cooking pots
blackened from outside are placed in the solar
box.
The uncooked food gets cooked with the heat
energy produced due to increased temperature of
the solar box. Collector area of such a solar cooker
can be increased by providing a plane reflector
mirror. When this reflector is adjusted to reflect
the sun rays into the box, then a 15°C to 25°C rise
in temperature is achieved inside the cooker box.
The solar cooker requires neither fuel nor
attention while cooking food and there is no
pollution, no charring or over flowing of food and
the most important advantage is that nutritional
value of the cooked food is very high as the
vitamins and natural tastes of the food are not
destroyed.

Maintenance cost of the solar cooker is negligible.

The main disadvantage of the solar cooker is that
the food cannot be cooked at night, during cloudy
days or at short notice. Cooking takes
comparatively more time and chapattis cannot be
cooked in a solar cooker.

VI. Solar Electric Power Generation (Photo

voltaic system):
Electric energy or electricity can be produced
directly from solar energy by means of
photovoltaic cells. The photovoltaic cell is an
energy conversion device which is used to convert
photons sunlight directly into electricity. It is
made of semiconductors which absorb the
photons received from the sun, creating free
electrons with high energies.
These high energy free electrons are induced by
an electric field, to flow out of the semiconductor
to do useful work. This electric field in photo
voltaic cells is usually provided by a p-n junction
of materials which have different electrical
properties.
There are different fabrication techniques to
enable these cells to achieve maximum efficiency.
These cells are arranged in parallel or series
combination to form cell modules. Some of the
special features of these modules are high
reliability, no expenditure on fuel, minimum cost
of maintenance, long life, portability, modularity,
pollution free working etc.

Application of photovoltaic cells have been used

to operate:
Irrigation pumps
Rail road crossing warnings
Navigational signals
Highway emergency call systems
Automatic meteorological station etc. in areas
where it is difficult to lay power lines
They are also used for weather monitoring and

Portable power sources for televisions,

calculators, watches, computer card readers,
battery charging and in satellites etc.

Besides these, photovoltaic cells are used for the

energisation of pump sets for irrigation, drinking
water supply and for providing electricity in rural
areas i.e. street lights etc.

The photovoltaic conversion systems convert

solar radiation directly into electricity through
silicon solar cells. These may be single crystal
silicon cell, polycrystalline cells, amorphsc solar
cells etc. such systems are used for community
lighting, radio and TV sets, light houses, offshore
platforms and installation in remote areas.
An important application of these systems is
pumping of water for micro-irrigation and
drinking purposes. Such systems are decentralized
on the spot electricity generation systems and
help to replace diesel utilizing systems.
They may be installed in remote areas as forests,
deserts etc. under the National Solar Photovoltaic
Energy Demonstration Program (NSPEDP) the
DNES has since 1980 installed a number of
photovoltaic devices with a target of producing 1
MW of electricity. Such systems are used for
pumping water, village electrification, use in TV
sets etc. In rural areas photovoltaic can be used as
a biomass based system.

The solar thermal system utilizes radiation in the

form of heat which can be converted in to
mechanical, electrical or chemical energy. The sun
rays are used to supersede a fluid that is then
used to drive an electricity generating turbine.

VII. Solar Thermal Power Production:

Solar thermal power production means the
conversion of solar energy into electricity through
thermal energy. In this procedure, solar energy is
first utilized to heat up a working fluid, gas, water
or any other volatile liquid. This heat energy is
then converted into mechanical energy in a
turbine.
Finally a conventional generator coupled to a
turbine converts this mechanical energy into
electrical energy.

VIII. Production of Power through Solar Ponds:

A solar pond is a natural or artificial body of water
utilized for collecting and absorbing solar
radiation and storing it as heat. It is very shallow
(5-10 Cm deep) and has a radiation absorbing
(black plastic) bottom.
It has a curved fibre glass cover over it to permit
the entry of solar radiation but reduces losses by
radiation and convection (air movement). Loss of
heat to the ground is minimized by providing a
bed of insulating material under the pond.

Solar ponds utilize water for collecting and storing

the solar energy which is used for many
applications such as space heating, industrial
process heating and to generate electricity by
driving a turbine powered by evaporating an
organic fluid with a low boiling point.
 IX. Solar Green Houses:
A green house is a structure covered with
transparent material (glass or plastic) that acts as
a solar collector and utilizes solar radiant energy
to grow plants. It has heating, cooling and
ventilating devices for controlling the
temperature inside the green house.
Solar radiations can pass through the green house
glazing but the thermal radiations emitted by the
objects within the green house cannot escape
through the glazed surface. As a result, the
radiations get trapped within the green house and
result in an increase in temperature.

As the green house structure has a closed

boundary, the air inside the greenhouse gets
enriched with CO2 as there is no mixing of the
green house air with the ambient air. Further,
there is reduced moisture loss due to restricted
transpiration. All these features help to sustain
plant growth throughout the day as well as during
the night and all year round.
In-spite of the intermittent and variable manner in
which solar energy arrives at the earth’s surface,
and the large area required to collect the energy
at a useful rate, solar energy is regarded as an
inexhaustible source of useful, non-polluting
energy.

3. Environmental Implications of Solar Energy:

The use of solar energy, from the environmental
view point, is a completely benign operation. In
case of solar thermal route, apart from land use,
there exist absolutely no environmental
consequences of producing energy from these
sources.
However, the sites for larger installations of
solar power plants should be selected without
reducing the forest cover.
Cadmium used in fabricating thin film solar cells,
is both poisonous and a possible carcinogen.
Since only small quantities of cadmium are
released from discarded PV panels, the dangers
involved are not so serious.
Carbon dioxide produced while forming silicon
from silica may increase the atmospheric
temperature causing green-house effect.
Silicon dust is also an important occupational
hazard.

4. Advantages of Solar Energy:

It is a renewable source of energy.
It is available at all parts of the world.
It is free source of energy.
It is non-polluting source of energy.

5. Disadvantages of Solar Energy:

It is intermittent in nature
Variable in nature.
It requires large area for collection and storage.

References:
1)https://www.environmentalpollution.in/proje
ct-report/solar-energy/project-report-on-solar-
energy/2102
2)https://www.slideshare.net/mobile/kenwong
1423/solar-energyreport