Case 13794

Self-cleaning Parabolic Trough for Concentrated Solar Power Systems

Keywords:

Concentrated Solar Power Systems (CSPS), Dust Removal, Parabolic Trough, Vortex Induced Vibration (VIV)

Applications:

Clean, renewable, and transportable energy conversion/storage

Problem:

Dust settles out of the atmosphere and deposits onto the reflector surface, degrading the performance of solar systems.

Technology:

The new parabola panel design combines the cleaning strategies of the natural direct cleaning method by wind effect and the cleaning by wind vortex induced vibration (VIV) method. Addition of geometrical features for the panel will control the air flow velocity across the panel surface and control the VIV.

Advantages:
  • Reduce maintenance costs
  • Reduce problems with flexure mounts
  • Passive and reliable

Inventors:
  • Professor Alexander Slocum (Department of Mechanical Engineering, MIT)
  • Associate Professor Bahaa Ibraheem Kazem (Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Baghdad)
  • Stacy Figueredo (Department of Mechanical Engineering, MIT)

Intellectual Property:

U.S. Patent Application 13/222547 filed August 31, 2011

Publications:

Last revised: November 29, 2011

»List of Energy IP«