Convective heat loss prediction from conical cavity receiver of solar parabolic dish collector using numerical method and artificial neural network

In this work, detailed investigations of convection heat loss from conical cavity receiver of solar parabolic dish collector using a numerical method and artificial neural network have been performed. The convective heat loss from the cavity receiver is primarily influenced by geometrical parameters, receiver orientation, and wind characteristics. The heat loss estimation is carried out by considering wind speed (V = 0–10 m/s), wind direction ((Formula presented.) = 90 (Formula presented.) and −90 (Formula presented.)), receiver tilt ((Formula presented.) = 0–90 (Formula presented.)), diameter to height ratio (d/h = 0.5–1.5), and surface temperature (T s = 500–800 K). The utmost heat loss occurs at a tilt of 60 (Formula presented.) for d/h < 1 and 75 (Formula presented.) for d/h (Formula presented.) 1 in head-on high wind speed, while in back-on high wind speed, it occurs at a tilt of 30 (Formula presented.) for all d/h values. The heat loss is lowest at 90° for V > 4 m/s. The d/h value of 0.5 performs well compared to other values. Further, the correlation for the Nusselt number has been proposed for the conical cavity receiver.