Parametric study of optical and thermal efficiency of solar cooker

Abstract

Mathematical model has been developed that gives insight in the performance of box-type solar cooker in terms of incident and absorbed solar radiation. Effect of incidence angle of sun rays on the performance of various components has been analyzed to compute the optical and thermal efficiency of the cooker. The design of cooker has been optimized, by understanding the modes of absorption of solar energy by various cooker components. The air gap between the absorber plate and the vessel base that acts as a resistance to the conductive heat transfer coefficient was estimated. Heat transfer coefficient between vessel and the absorber plate for various contact mediums has been estimated and the heating performance was also compared. Computational results have been validated experimentally. It has been observed that the optical and thermal efficiencies were enhanced by 9 and 10%, respectively. Water as the contacting medium gives the highest thermal efficiency.