Effects of CuO/water nanouid on the efciency of a at-plate solar

collector
Ali Jabari Moghadam
a,
, Mahmood Farzane-Gord
a
, Mahmood Sajadi
a
, Monireh Hoseyn-Zadeh
b
a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Shahrood University of Technology, Shahrood, Iran
b
Faculty of Science, Ferdowsi University, Mashhad, Iran
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 7 March 2014
Received in revised form 4 June 2014
Accepted 13 June 2014
Available online 24 June 2014
Keywords:
Flat plate solar collector
Nanouid
Experimental study
Efciency
a b s t r a c t
Solar water heating is an effective method for heat demands in domestic applications. Solar collector is a
main component of any solar water heating system. In this work, the effect of CuOwater nanouid, as
the working uid, on the performance and the efciency of a at-plate solar collector is investigated
experimentally. The volume fraction of nanoparticles is set to 0.4% and the mean particle dimension is
kept constant at 40 nm. The working uid mass ow rate is varied from 1 to 3 kg/min. The experiments
are conducted in Mashhad, Iran with the latitude of 36.19. The experimental results reveal that utilizing
the nanouid increases the collector efciency in comparison to water as an absorbing medium. The
nanouid with mass ow rate of 1 kg/min increases the collector efciency about 21.8%. For any partic-
ular working uid, there is an optimum mass ow rate which maximizes the collector efciency. Adding
nanoparticles to a base uid produces a nanouid which has enhanced thermal characteristics compared
with its base uid.
2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Solar heat is being widely used for providing heat for many
houses. Solar Water Heating is an effective method of utilizing
solar heat to perform many useful tasks. The energy from the
sun can provide hot water for many applications, displacing the
need to burn fossil fuels. A solar collector is the main component
for absorbing heat from solar beam and utilizing it for heating
purposes. One way to absorb more heat from the solar beam is
to modify heat characteristics of the working uid.
Nanouids are suspensions of metallic or nonmetallic nanopar-
ticles in a base uid; this term was introduced by Choi [1]. A sub-
stantial increase in liquid thermal conductivity, liquid viscosity,
and heat transfer coefcient are the unique characteristics of
nanouids. It is well known that metals in solid phase have higher
thermal conductivities than those of uids [2]. For example, the
thermal conductivity of copper at room temperature is about 700
times greater than that of water and about 3000 times greater than
that of engine oil. The thermal conductivity of metallic liquids is
much greater than that of nonmetallic liquids. Thus, uids contain-
ing suspended metal particles are expected apparent enhanced
thermal conductivities rather than pure uids [3]. Masuda et al.
[4] dispersed oxide nanoparticles (Al
2
O
3
and TiO
2
with 4.3 wt%)
in liquid and showed that the thermal conductivity is increased
by 32% and 11%, respectively. Grimm [5] dispersed aluminum
particles (180 nm) in a uid and claimed a 100% increase in the
thermal conductivity of uid for 0.510 wt%.
Using the nanouids in solar collectors has been subjected to a
few recent studies. Yose et al. [6] investigated the effect of
MWCNT as an absorbing medium on the efciency of a at-plate
solar collector experimentally and reported 35% enhancement in
the collector efciency for 0.4 wt%. Also the same researchers [7]
repeated the experiments with Al
2
O
3
Water nanouid and
reported 28.3% enhancement in the collector efciency for
0.2 wt%. Chaji et al. [8] used TiO
2
Water nanouid as a working
uid at a small at plate solar collector and observed 15.7%
enhancement in the collector efciency (compared with pure
water). Polvongsri and Kiatsiriroat [9] investigated the thermal
enhancement of a at plate solar collector with silver nanouid.
They concluded that using this nanouid can improve thermal
performance of at plate collector compared with water especially
at high inlet temperature. He et al. [10] investigated the light-heat
conversion characteristics of two nanouids, waterTiO
2
and
watercarbon nanotube (CNT), in a vacuum tube solar collector
under sunny and cloudy weather conditions. The experimental
results show very good light heat conversion characteristics of
the CNTH
2
O nanouid with the weight concentration of 0.5%.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.expthermusci.2014.06.014
0894-1777/ 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Corresponding author. Address: Mechanical Engineering, Shahrood University

of Technology, P.O. Box 316, Shahrood, Iran. Tel./fax: +98 273 3300258.
E-mail address: jm.ali.project@gmail.com (A.J. Moghadam).
Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science 58 (2014) 914
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science
j our nal homepage: www. el sevi er . com/ l ocat e/ et f s
Because of the better light-heat conversion characteristics of the
CNTH
2
O nanouid compared to the TiO
2
H
2
O nanouid, the
temperature of the CNTH
2
O nanouid is higher than that of the
TiO
2
H
2
O one. Lue et al. [11] examined thermal performance of
an open thermo-siphon which uses CuoWater nanouid for
high-temperature evacuated tubular solar collectors. They showed
that with optimal lling ratio 60% and optimal mass concentration
1.2%, evaporating heat transfer coefcients may increase by about
30% compared with those of pure water. Keshavarz and Razvarz
[12] experimentally studied the effect of Al
2
O
3
/Water nanouid
on the efciency enhancement of a heat pipe at different operating
conditions. They concluded that the thermal efciency of a heat
pipe charged with nanouids is higher than that of pure water as
working uid. Saidur et al. [13] also theoretically investigated the
effect of using Al
2
O
3
/Water nanouid on the performance of direct
solar collector. They showed that using nanouids within 1.0% vol-
ume fraction gave a promising improvement on the direct solar
collector performance. Sani et al. [14] introduced a new nanouid,
made from dispersing carbon nanohorn in ethylene glycol, for solar
energy applications. Their results show that this nanouid is useful
for increasing the efciency of solar thermal devices and costs
reduction (in comparison with carbon-black nanouid). Natarjan
[15] investigated the thermal conductivity enhancement of a base
uid using carbon nanotube (CNT). According to their results, if
these uids are used as heat transport media, the efciency of
the conventional solar water heater will be increased. Tyagi et al.
[16] studied the capability of using a non-concentrating direct
absorption solar collector (DAC) theoretically and compared its
performance with a conventional at-plate collector. In their
research, a nanouid composed of water and aluminum nanoparti-
cles, was used as the absorbing medium. According to their results,
the efciency of a DAC with nanouid is up to 10% higher than that
of a at-plate collector. Otanicar [17] studied environmental and
economical effects of using nanouids to enhance the solar collec-
tor efciency compared with conventional solar collectors. Otani-
car et al. [18] studied experimentally the effect of different
nanouids on the efciency of the micro-thermal-collector. He
reported an efciency improvement up to 5% by utilizing the nano-
uids as the absorption medium. Mahian et al. [19] examined the
nanouids applications in solar thermal engineering systems; in
this review, the effects of nanouids on the performance of solar
collectors and solar water heaters were investigated from the ef-
ciency, economic and environmental considerations viewpoints.
The aim of the current experimental work is to investigate the
effect of using particular nanouid, CuOH
2
O, as an absorbing
medium (the working uid) on the efciency of a at-plate solar
collector. A review of the literature shows that there is no work
on the at-plate solar collector performance using CuO/water as
the working uid. For this purpose, a commercial at plate collec-
tor is selected to carry out the experiments in NorthEast of Iran
during summer 2012. The effect of the absorbing medium mass
ow rate on the collector efciency is investigated. The efciency
values of nanouid and water (as two working uids) are
compared.
2. Experimental device and method
2.1. Experimental procedure
A schematic diagram of the experimental setup and the picture
are shown in Figs. 1 and 2, respectively. The solar collector perfor-
mance has been experimentally investigated in Mashhad, Iran (lati-
tude N and longitude 59.37E). The collector specications are given
in Table 1. The working uid is circulated through the collector by
using an electrical pump. The solar system tank serves as a heat
exchanger for absorbing the heat loaded from the collector and then
delivering it to the cooling water. The tank capacity is nearly 20 l. A
heat exchanger has been placed inside the tank to transfer heat load
from the solar collector to the cooling water. A ow meter was
installed on the pipe after the electric pump. A simple valve was also
installed after the electric pump to control the working uid mass
ow rate. Two temperature sensors were used to measure the uid
temperature at the inlet and outlet of the solar collector. The ambi-
ent temperature was measured by a thermometer. The total solar
radiation was measured by a TES 1333 R solar meter. Also the wind
Nomenclature
A
C
surface area of solar collector (m
2
)
C
p
heat capacity (J/kg K)
C
p,bf
heat capacity of base uid (J/kg K)
C
p,np
heat capacity of nanoparticles (J/kg K)
F
R
heat removal factor
G
T
global radiation (W/m
2
)
_ m mass ow rate (kg/min)
n number of day in year
P
t
error of parameters
P
Y
overall error
Q
u
rate of useful energy gained (W)
t time (s)
T
a
ambient temperature (K)
T
i
inlet uid temperature of collector (K)
T
o
outlet uid temperature of collector (K)
T
o,i
collector outlet initial uid temperature (K)
T
o,s
collector outlet uid temperature after time s (K)
U
L
overall loss coefcient of solar collector (w/m2k)
X
t
measured parameters in error analysis
Y the calculated quantity from the measured results
Greek Symbols
sa absorptancetransmittance product
s time constant of solar collector (s)
g
i
efciency of at-plate solar collector
b slope of collector
d declination
u volume fraction
; latitude
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the experimental setup (1. Collector 2. Pump 3. Heat
exchanger 4. Tank 5. Thermometer 6. Solar meter 7. Control valve 8. Automate valve
9. Rotameter).
10 A.J. Moghadam et al. / Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science 58 (2014) 914
speed was measured by a PROVA (AV M-0736.19) anemometer. The
instruments were calibrated for each individual experiment.
In this study, deionized water and water-based CuO nanouids
were used as the working uid. Copper oxide spherical nanoparti-
cles with purity 99.9% and mean diameter of 40 nm are purchased
from NANOSANY CORPORATION. The black CuO nanoparticles
which are insoluble in water have a bulk density and true density
of 0.79 g/cm
3
and 6.4 g/m
3
, respectively. The nanouids have been
prepared by dispersing CuO nanoparticles into the base uid
directly; after which they were oscillated continuously for about
2 h in an ultrasonic homogenizer (XL-2020). The volume fraction
of nanoparticles in the uid was 0.4%. The prepared nanouid
solution is illustrated in Fig. 3. The nanoparticle diameter and the
nanouid volume fraction were selected based on the previous
studies [618]. Otanicar et al. [16] have investigated the effects
of variety of nanoparticles: carbon nano-tubes, graphite, and silver
on performance of a at plate collector and reported a rapid ef-
ciency increases up to volume fraction of 0.4 followed by a leveling
off from 0.5. Here 0.4 is selected as volume fraction for higher
collector performance and also to avoid particle precipitation and
instability in the base uid.
2.2. Testing method
The ASHRAE Standard 86-93 [20] for testing thermal perfor-
mance of a solar collector is certainly one of the most important
standards used to evaluate the performance of at-plate and
concentrating solar collectors. The standard calculates the perfor-
mance by obtaining the values of instantaneous efciency for var-
ious combinations of incident radiation, ambient temperature, and
inlet uid temperature. This requires experimental measurement
of the incidence solar radiation rate as well as the energy rate
absorbed by the working uid. It should be pointed out that the
experiments have to be performed under a steady state or quasi-
steady-state condition. In addition, some experiments should be
performed to examine the collector transient thermal response
characteristics.
The optimum collector slope is calculated as follows [21]:
b j; dj 1
where ; is the latitude and d is given by:
d 23=45sin 360
n 284
365

2
in which, n is the number of day in a year. In this study, the opti-
mum slope of the collector is obtained 17 for a two-month period.
The collector heat capacity can be dened in terms of a time con-
stant. It is also necessary to determine the time response of the
solar collector in order to evaluate the transient behavior of the col-
lector and to select the correct time intervals for steady-state ef-
ciency tests. The time constant of a collector is the time required
for the uid leaving the collector to arrive 63% of its nal steady
state value after a step change in incident radiation:
T
o;s
T
o;i
T
o;i
T
i
0:368 3
where, T
o,s
is the collector outlet uid temperature after time t, T
o,i
is the collector outlet initial uid temperature, and T
i
is the collector
inlet uid temperature.
The mass ow rate accuracy must be held within 1%, irradia-
tion must be steady within 50 W/m
2
, the outdoor ambient
temperature must not vary more than 1.5 K, and the inlet temper-
ature must be within 0.1 K for the entire test period. The pre-data
period is dened to maintain steady-state conditions during a
specied time interval prior to the data period. A test period con-
tains both the pre-data and the data periods. For outdoor tests with
a xed test setup, the pre-data period is 15 min and the data period
is set to a 5 min interval or an interval equal to the collector time
constant.
2.3. Efciency calculation
The ASHRAE Standard suggests performing the experiments in
various inlet temperatures. An acceptable distribution of inlet tem-
peratures is obtained by setting T
i
to ambient air temperature, 30%,
60%, 90% the manufacturers recommended maximum operating
temperature for the collector. After steady state conditions are
met, the data of each test period are averaged and used in the
Fig. 2. A picture of the experimental setup.
Table 1
Specications of the at-plate solar collector.
Specication Dimension Unit
Occupied area 200 94 9.5 cm
Absorption area 1.51 m
2
Weight 38.5 kg
Frame (Al6063 extruded)
Glass (float) t = 4 mm
Header pipe (cu) U = 22, t = 0.9 mm
Connector riser pipe to absorber sheet (cu) U = 10, t = 0.9 mm
Absorption sheet:
Thermal emission: 7%
Solar absorption: 96.2%
Coating method: vacuum
Magnetron sputtering
Fig. 3. Production of nanouid.
A.J. Moghadam et al. / Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science 58 (2014) 914 11
analysis as a single point. The inlet and outlet uid temperatures as
well as the uid mass ow rate are measured, and then, the useful
energy is calculated from Eq. (4). The useful energy can also be
expressed in terms of the energy absorbed by the absorber and
the energy lost from the absorber by Eq. (5).
Q
u
_ mC
p
T
o
T
i
4
Q
u
A
c
F
R
G
T
sa U
L
T
i
T
a
5
where C
p
is the heat capacity of water or nanouid. The heat capac-
ity of the nanouid is calculated as follow [22]:
C
p;nf
C
p;np
u C
p;bf
1 u 6
where u indicates the volume fraction of nanoparticles, C
p,np
and
C
p,bf
are 530.5 J/kg K and 4182 J/kg K, respectively.
The instantaneous collector efciency relates the useful energy
to the total energy incident on the collector surface by the follow-
ing equations:
g
i

Q
u
A
C
G
T

_ mC
p
T
o
T
i

A
C
G
T
7
g
i
F
R
sa F
R
U
L
T
i
T
a
G
T
8
If the normal incidence conditions are nearly provided, F
R
(sa)
may be assumed constant within the measured temperature
ranges. So according to Eq. (8), a straight line will be obtained for
the collector efciency. This line intersects the vertical axis
(efciency) at F
R
(sa). At this point, the temperature of the uid
entering the collector equals the ambient temperature, and the
maximum collector efciency is achieved. In this study, it is nom-
inated as the absorbed energy parameter. The line slope which is
equal to F
R
U
L
indicates that howenergy has removed fromthe solar
collector, and so it has been nominated as the removed energy
parameter.
The experiments have been performed at the time interval
1015 a.m. The experimental results are presented in the form of
graphs that describe the collector efciency against a reduced
temperature parameter (T
i
T
a
)/G
T
.
All the presented data were divided into several test runs. Each
test run was divided into several test periods in a quasi-steady
state condition. The maximumvariations in ambient and inlet tem-
peratures in each test period are 0.8 C and 0.5 C, respectively,
while in global radiation, it is 30 W/m
2
. Hence our data satisfy
the necessities presented in the ASHRAE Standard 93-2003.
2.4. Error analysis
Evaluation of errors in the experiments is necessary to perform
a valid test. In this study, we use Eq. (9) for this purpose [23]:
P
Y

X
n
i1
@Y
@X
t
P
t

2
" #
1=2
9
In the current study, Y is efciency, X
t
is the measured parame-
ter (mass ow rate, heat capacity, inlet and outlet temperatures
and total radiation) and P
t
is the error of each parameter.
3. Results and discussion
The solar collector was tested for various mass ow rates (1,2
and 3 kg/min). Each experiment was performed in several days
and the best experimental data, which have minimum errors and
satisfy the standard conditions, have been selected and presented.
It should be noted that the time constant of the solar collector at
each mass ow rate is determined separately. Figs. 4 and 5
represent variations of the collector efciency versus the reduced
temperature parameter, (T
i
T
a
)/G
T
, for each mass ow rate. The
experimental data are tted with linear equations to provide the
characteristic parameters of the at-plate solar collector in order
to compare the effect of various mass ow rates. The efciency
parameters, F
R
U
L
and F
R
(sa), as well as the time constant values
at each mass ow rate are expressed in Tables 2 and 3.
Fig. 4 shows the efciency of the collector in various mass ow
rates with the pure water as the working uid. When the mass ow
rate is increased from 1 kg/min to 2 kg/min, the efciency
increases; while increasing the mass ow rate to 3 kg/min causes
the efciency to decrease. In fact, change in the mass ow rate
exhibits no denite behavior; and an optimum value of the mass
ow rate is probably observed. The Reynolds numbers for mass
ow rates of 3, 2, and 1 kg/min are 3248, 2682 and 2192, respec-
tively [24]. Table 2 shows that the F
R
(sa) value of the collector is
highest for 2 kg/min, and the F
R
U
L
value in this mass ow rate is
lowest. Based on Eq. (8), the highest efciency of the solar collector
is achieved for this mass ow rate (2 kg/min). According to Fig. 4,
the solar collector efciency is optimum for the 2 kg/min mass
ow rate.
Fig. 5 shows the collector efciency in various mass ow rates
when CuO nanouid is used as the working uid. It is observed that
Fig. 4. The efciency of the at-plate solar collector for water as the working uid
in various mass ow rates.
Fig. 5. The efciency of the at-plate solar collector for CuO nanouid as the
working uid in various mass ow rates.
Table 2
Thermal characteristics of the collector with water as working uid in various mass
ow rates.
Mass ow rate (kg/min) s (sec) F
R
(sa) U
L
1 65 0.5342 4.92
2 67 0.6677 12.61
3 80 0.5647 14.82
12 A.J. Moghadam et al. / Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science 58 (2014) 914
decreasing the mass ow rate leads to increasing the collector
efciency; since the low mass ow rate and hence the small uid
velocity causes absorbing more solar energy. In this case, the
highest efciency is achieved for 1 kg/min. Therefore, it can be
concluded that the optimum mass ow rate depends upon the
working uid thermal characteristics. The Reynolds numbers for
mass ow rates of 3, 2, and 1 kg/min are 1857, 1104 and 977,
respectively [24]. Increasing mass ow rate increases Reynolds
and Nusselt numbers, but decreases the temperature difference
between the collector inlet and outlet. Thus, the heat transfer rate
is inuenced by these two parameters. Table 3 show that the F
R
(sa)
value of the collector is highest for 1 kg/min, and the F
R
U
L
value in
this mass ow rate is lowest. Therefore, based on Eq. (8), the high-
est efciency of the solar collector is attained for this mass ow
rate. According to Fig. 5, the solar collector efciency is optimum
for the 1 kg/min mass ow rate.
Figs. 6 and 7 show the effect of working uids on the collector
efciency for each mass ow rate. As shown in Fig. 6, the efciency
of the at-plate solar collector with CuO nanouid at 3 kg/min is
almost the same as water at 2 kg/min (Fig. 7) and 1 kg/min
(Fig. 8). Generally, the solar collector efciency with nanouid is
higher than that of water. This can be deduced by comparing the
value of F
R
(sa) (the absorbed energy parameter) and U
L
(heat loses)
for CuO nanouid and water in Tables 2 and 3. The tables values
show that when the absorbed energy parameter is high and the
collector heat loss is low, the efciency is increased. Averagely,
the efciency values for 2 and 1 kg/min mass ow rates in the case
CuO nanouid are higher than that of water by 4.74% and 21.8%,
respectively.
Fig. 9 shows that the efciency of CuO nanouid (1 kg/min) is
higher than that of water (2 kg/min) by 16.7%; the errors were
calculated for each data set. In general, there were 96 data for ef-
ciency calculations. Error values for each data set were calculated
by using Eq. (9). Sampling error calculation for one data set is given
in Table 4. The maximum and minimum values of error are found
to be 8.4% and 1.7%, respectively. When a nanouid is selected as
the working uid, its nanoparticles serve as traveling media, and
their mass migration phenomenon helps the heat transfer
enhancement. Adding CuO nanoparticles to water produces a
nanouid that has some advantages (compared with pure water)
to enhance heat transfer. The darkened working uid with better
absorptivity than water (and also enhanced thermal conductivity),
the Brownian motion of the particles as well as enlarged heat
Table 3
Thermal characteristics of the collector with nanouid as working uid in various
mass ow rate.
Mass ow rate (kg/min) s (sec) F
R
(sa) U
L
1 87 0.7574 4.38
2 98 0.7081 11.17
3 110 0.5231 8.76
Fig. 6. The efciency of the at-plate solar collector for water and nanouid in 3 kg/
min mass ow rate.
Fig. 7. The efciency of the at-plate solar collector for water and nanouid in 2 kg/
min mass ow rate.
Fig. 8. The efciency of the at-plate solar collector for water and nanouid in 1 kg/
min mass ow rate.
Fig. 9. The at-plate solar collector efciency for water and nanouid at their
optimum mass ow rates.
Table 4
Sampling error calculation for one data set.
Inlet
temperature
Outlet
temperature
Total
radiation
Mass ow
rate
Data (X
t
) 58.4 68.2 1255 0.033
Error (P
t
) 0.1 0.1 1 0.0017
@Y
@Xt
Pt
0.0055 0.005498 0.00043 0.027766
Efciency (Y) 0.544
Error of efciency (P
Y
) 0.028838
A.J. Moghadam et al. / Experimental Thermal and Fluid Science 58 (2014) 914 13
transfer surface (between the nanoparticles and the base uid), all
together improve the heat transfer process; and the experiment
results are well justied.
4. Conclusions
The effects of using CuO nanouid as the absorbing medium
on the at-plate solar collector efciency have been studied
experimentally. The experiments are carried out in Mashhad, Iran
(latitude 36.19N and longitude 59.37E). The inuence of the mass
ow rate on the solar collector efciency has also been investi-
gated. The working uid mass ow rate has been selected in the
range of 13 kg/min. The volume fraction of nanoparticles is set
to 0.4%; the particle dimension is 40 nm. The results demonstrate
that using CuOH
2
O nanouid increases the solar collector ef-
ciency in comparison with that of water by 16.7% (especially in
the optimum mass ow rate). The experimental results also prove
that the highest heat absorption by the collector occurs at different
mass ow rates for water and nanouid. The optimum mass ow
rate depends on the working uid thermal characteristics.
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