Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

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Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/seta

Original article

Solar energy harvesting by cobalt oxide nanoparticles, a nanofluid

absorption based system
Vishal Bhalla, Himanshu Tyagi ⇑
School of Mechanical, Materials and Energy Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Ropar, Rupnagar 140001, Punjab, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The improvement in the conversion of solar energy to thermal energy has been taking place over the last
Received 26 October 2016 several years due to the growing demand of efficient solar powered systems. In recent times, nanofluid
Revised 26 January 2017 has emerged as an efficient heat transfer fluid due to its inherent capability to increase the solar-thermal
Accepted 26 January 2017
performance. The present study comprises of a detailed experimental work to compare the effectiveness
Available online xxxx
of two different types of system, viz. surface absorption system and nanofluid absorption system. The
effectiveness of these systems have been evaluated based on the ability to raise the average temperature
Keywords:
of the working fluid above the ambient temperature. The comparative study revealed an optimum range
Nanofluid
Nanoparticles
of cobalt oxide nanoparticle’s mass fraction (i.e. 40 mg/l), which leads to a rise in average temperature of
Solar energy about 23.3 °C while using nanofluid absorption system. This value is almost 9.3 °C higher as compared to
Heat transfer the surface absorption system under similar conditions which give a corresponding rise of about 14 °C.
Surface absorption The study pointed out that the direct absorption of solar energy by the nanofluid is an important factor
Direct absorption for overall increase in temperature (and consequently will lead to higher collector efficiencies). The work
Optical properties also highlights the use of cobalt oxide (Co3O4) based nanofluid for enhanced heat transfer events.
Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction
Solar energy is a large, clean and freely available source of
energy. As per current environmental scenario [1], it is recom-
mended to use solar energy over fossil fuels [2]. Presently, solar
energy can be harness by two main methods (a) solar photovoltaic
and (b) solar thermal [3]. The solar photovoltaic device works by
directly converting the solar energy to the electrical energy [4].
However to run a power generation cycle from solar energy, solar
thermal collectors are used [5,6]. These solar thermal collectors
typically comprise of a receiver, heat transfer fluid, and power gen-
eration cycle, where receiver is considered as the main component
in which the solar energy is converted into thermal gain of the
working fluid [7].
Most commercially available solar thermal collectors consist of
receivers that are constructed from a metallic absorber plate
(usually employing selective coatings), which absorb the irradia-
tion, convert that into thermal energy and transfer that energy to
the working fluid either by conduction or convection heat transfer
mechanism [8] (such systems are referred as surface absorption
system and are abbreviated as ‘SAS’ in this paper). The perfor-
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: himanshu.tyagi@iitrpr.ac.in (H. Tyagi).
mance of the solar thermal collector and the overall system is
directly dependent on the temperature rise of the fluid in the recei-
ver, because of which the solar thermal collectors are targeted to
operate at high temperature. To achieve high temperature, the
solar radiation are usually highly concentrated (using line or point
concentration geometry), and that leads to the overheating of the
material. Such cyclic variations of high temperatures may eventu-
ally damage the material. However, the efficiency of the solar col-
lector does not depend on the absorption efficiency only, but also
on how the thermal and re-radiating losses to the surroundings
can be minimized [9]. When the temperature of the fluid in the
receiver increases, it starts re-radiating to the environment and
these radiative losses are proportional to the fourth power of the
temperature [10]. Therefore, the efficiency of solar thermal collec-
tor can be improved by reducing these radiative emission losses.
One of the ways to achieve this is to allow the solar radiation to
be directly absorbed by heat transfer fluid.
In recent time, the researchers have explored such type of solar
collectors in which the solar irradiation has been directly absorbed
by the heat transfer fluid not by any absorbing surface. It is
observed that most of the heat transfer fluids (distilled water, ethy-
lene glycol, silicone oil, Therminol VP-1, molten salts etc.) are
transparent with the spectral range of 0.2–1.5 lm, so these fluids
are not good absorber of solar irradiation by themselves [12]. Some
dopant (nanoparticles) need to be added in these fluids, which can

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seta.2017.01.011
2213-1388/Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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2 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx
Nomenclature
D diameter
fv mass fraction
H height
I flux
Io incident flux
K optical coefficient
m complex refractive index, m = n + ij
T temperature
y thickness of fluid layer
Greek Symbols
a absorptivity
b size parameter
e emissivity
n index of refraction
j index of absorption
absorb the irradiation and in turn transfer the heat to the fluid
(such systems are referred as nanofluid absorption system and
are abbreviated as ‘NAS’ in this paper) [13–19]. These types of solar
thermal collectors have many advantages over the SAS, like (a) low
surface temperature (i.e. low radiative and convective losses) (b)
prevention of thermal stress (c) decreased problem of hot spot
caused by high heat flux concentration (d) low weight and (e) cost
[11]. The nanoparticles have very high heat transfer coefficient in
the order of 108 (Wm
2 K) so they are very efficient to transfer
the heat to the fluid in immediate contact [20,21]. The optical
properties of the nanoparticles are dependent on shape, size, con-
stituent material and the surrounding dielectric medium. So for
solar thermal energy applications, the nanoparticles can be opti-
cally tuned accordingly [22].
During recent years, various kinds of nanoparticles have been
used by the researchers to harness the solar energy. For instance,
Tyagi et al. [23] carried out numerical study with aluminium/water
nanofluid for low temperature direct absorption solar collector and
concluded that the absorption of irradiation has increased by nine
times over pure water. Moreover, under similar working condi-
tions, the direct absorption solar collector has 10% higher efficiency
than conventional flat plate solar collector.
Otanicar et al. [24] carried out numerical and experimental
study with various types of nanoparticles (carbon nanotubes, gra-
phite, and silver) on flat plate collector and suggested that there
has 5% improvement in the efficiency of the solar collector by using
nanoparticles. Taylor et al. [25] suggested through the numerical
and experimental study on the parabolic dish collector with gra-
phite/Therminol VP-1 nanofluid that 10% enhancement in effi-
ciency can be achieved relative to surface absorption based
receivers when the concentration ratios are in the range of 100–
1000. Further graphite nanofluid with volume fraction on the order
of 0.001% are suitable for 10–100 MWe power plants. Lee et al. [26]
carried out numerical study with the Gold-nanoshell nanoparticles
on flat plate collector and concluded that the use of blended nano-
fluid can increase the solar collector efficiency with an very low
particle concentration (e.g. approximately 70% for 0.05% particle
volume fraction) Lenert and Wang [27] prototyped a nanofluid
based cylindrical receiver which has been optimized with carbon
coated nanoparticles suspended in Therminol VP-1. They sug-
gested that the receiver efficiency is directly proportional to nano-
fluid height and incident solar flux. Khullar et al. [28] performed
numerical analysis of nanofluid based concentrating parabolic
solar collector (NCPSC) with Aluminium/Therminol VP-1, and sug-
gested that by maintaining same external conditions the NCPCS
Please cite this article in press as: Bhalla V, Tyagi H. Solar energy harvesting by cobalt oxide nanoparticles, a nanofluid absorption based system. Sustain-
able Energy Technologies and Assessments (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seta.2017.01.011
Subscripts
a absorption
e extinction
s scattering
k spectral
Abbreviations:
Co3O4 cobalt oxide
CMC critical micelle concentration
DAQ data Acquisition
NAS nanofluid absorption system
NCPCS nanofluid based concentrating parabolic solar collector
SAS surface Absorption System
Stag stagnation
SWF short wave filter
has about 5–10% higher efficiency as compared to the conventional
parabolic solar collector. He et al. [29] performed experiments with
Cu/H2O nanofluid and they observed that with Cu/H2O nanofluid
(0.1 wt%) the temperature can be increased up to 23.5% as com-
pared with deionized water. Khullar et al. [30] experimentally
compare the performance of amorphous carbon nanoparticles
and multi-walled carbon nanotubes suspended in ethylene glycol
with the commercially available selective coating in cylindrical
container. They suggested that the performance of the nanofluid
based system is sensitive to the amount of the nanoparticles dis-
persed. Liu et al. [31] performed numerical and experimental study
with graphene/ionic liquid based nanofluid. The numerical model
showed that the receiver efficiency is directly proportional to solar
concentration and the receiver height, but conversely with gra-
phene concentration under concentrated solar intensity. Karami
et al. [32] and Menbari et al. [18] performed experimental studies
with CuO/water + ethylene glycol and CuO/water nanofluid respec-
tively and showed that with the use of CuO nanoparticles there has
an increase in the efficiency of the direct absorption solar collector.
Verma et al. [19] performed experimental study on flat plate col-
lector with MgO/H2O nanofluid under 8  500 W Infrared lamp
and experimentally found that there is about 9% thermal efficiency
enhancement for 0.75% volume fraction at flow rate of 1.5 lpm.
The review of previous studies indicates that no study has been
conducted with the cobalt oxide nanoparticles. The present exper-
imental study attempts to do a careful thermal analysis in the
absence of convective heat transfer for nanofluid absorption sys-
tem (NAS) and surface absorption system (SAS). For NAS, cobalt
nanoparticles (Co3O4, Nanostructured and Amorphous Materials,
Inc., 10–30 nm Average particle size, 99.8% purity) have been used
to harness the incident radiation. Further to access the potential of
these particles as an efficient solar energy harvester, these
nanoparticles have been compared with commercially available
solar selective surface (TiNOXÒ, thickness 0.2 mm, a = 95%,
e = 4%) [33]. TiNOXÒ is a composite coating of multiple layers like
protective layer, antireflective layer, absorber layer, bonding layer
and substrate. Each layer has a different role to play e.g. antireflec-
tive layer ensures maximum transmissivity so that most of the
incident solar irradiance reaches the absorber layer. The absorber
layer material is selected in such a way that it can absorb maxi-
mum irradiation. Substrate should be IR reflective for low radiative
losses. The entire layers work together to ensure high solar absorp-
tivity and low IR emissivity.
Different mass fractions of the nanofluid have been irradiated to
predict the optimum mass fraction where the temperature rise is
 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 3

maximum. The main objective of the present study is to compare Transmittance of nanofluid
the photo thermal effect of both systems under similar operating
conditions. The spectral transmittance of nanofluid has been investigated to
find out the effectiveness of its light absorption. Transmittance of
Optical properties of nanofluid nanofluid has been find out using Eq. (2)
I
Io
¼ expð
K ek yÞ ð2Þ
The selection of suitable base fluid and nanoparticles is the
most critical step in the designing of nanofluid based absorption where Kek is the spectral extinction coefficient of the nanofluid and
system. In order to determine the nanoparticles dispersion, it is y is the optical thickness. For the calculation of transmittance y has
very important to carry out the optical properties of base fluid been taken as 10 mm.
and nanoparticles. With the optical properties we can determine The extinction coefficient has been calculated by using Eq. (3).
the right mix of base fluid-nanoparticles for the solar thermal ( "
 #)
applications. In the NAS, the performance of the collector mainly 6pf v m2
1 p2 D2 m2
1 m4 þ 27m2 þ 38
K ek ¼ Im 1 þ
depend on the spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) of the nano- k m2 þ 2 15k2 m2 þ 2 2m2 þ 3
fluid. In this study, the optical properties of the nanofluid has 
2
4p4 D3 f v  m2
1 
been investigated numerically. The effect of nanoparticles size þ  ð3Þ
(diameter of the nanoparticles) and the concentration of nanopar- k 4  m þ2 
2

ticles on the enhancement of optical properties have been

explored.
Transmittance of base fluid (water)
The spectral transmittance of base fluid (water) has been inves-
tigated to find out the effectiveness of its light absorption. The
transmittance of the water has been found out by using Eq. (1).


I 4p j
¼ exp
y ð1Þ
Io k
where j is the index of absorption for water and y is optical thick-
ness. In this calculation y has been taken as 10 mm. The transmit-
tance spectra for water is as shown in Fig. 1. To draw Fig. 1, the
values of optical constants j have been taken from Ref. [34] and
to calculate spectral transmittance the values of j have been substi-
tuted in Eq. (1). The values from Eq. (1) have been plotted and
shown in Fig. 1.
From Fig. 1 we can conclude that pure water is almost transpar-
ent in the VIS-NIR region. There has a small absorption of the light
nearly at 1900 nm and after that maximum absorption of the light
takes place in the infrared region (k > 2500 nm). The transmittance
spectra shows that the pure water is nearly transparent in the
short wavelength region, makes them poor absorber of solar
energy in this region. So, for low temperature application water
can be used as base fluid in the nanofluid absorption system.
where fv is the mass fraction of the nanoparticles, m
(m ¼ mparticle =nfluid ) is the complex refractive index and mparticle =
n + ij. The values for optical constants (n and j) have been taken
from Ref. [35] and substituted in Eq. (3) to calculate spectral extinc-
tion coefficient. Then the values of spectral extinction coefficient
from Eq. (3) have been substituted in Eq. (2) to calculate the spectral
transmittance. The spectral transmittance for different mass frac-
tion (20, 40, 60 and 80 mg/l) of nanofluid is as shown in Fig. 2.
From Fig. 2, it has been observed that Co3O4 based nanofluid has
absorptivity in 350–650 nm. Furthermore, it has been observed
from Fig. 2 that the spectral transmittance of nanofluid decreases
with the increase of the amount of nanoparticles dispersed in the
base fluid. Hence, Fig. 2 signifies that addition of nanoparticles in
the base fluid can increase the solar irradiation absorption capac-
ity. Even higher orders of absorption can be obtained (compared
to the ones shown in Fig. 2), provided samples of greater optical
thickness are used.
Optical properties of nanoparticles
The spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) of cobalt oxide
nanoparticles has been calculated numerically by using the Eq. (4):
n h   io
K ak ¼ 6pkf v Im m 1 þ p15kD2 m
2
1 2 2 2
1 m4 þ27m2 þ38
m2 þ2 m2 þ2 2m2 þ3
ð4Þ
To evaluate the spectral absorption coefficient, optical constants
plays an important role and the values of optical constants have

Fig. 1. Transmittance versus wavelength for distilled water in solar spectrum Fig. 2. Transmittance versus wavelength for different mass fraction of nanoparti-
region. cles suspended in water having optical depth of 10 mm.

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4 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx
been taken from Ref. [35]. These optical constants have been substi-
tuted in Eq. (4) and calculated the spectral absorption coefficient. To
draw Fig. 3 different values of diameters (1, 10, 15, 20 and 30 nm)
have been substituted in Eq. (4) while keeping the value of mass
fraction constant (10 mg/l).
The size of the nanoparticles is very small and it is seen that the
diameter of the nanoparticles does not play a significant role in the
spectral absorption coefficient (as shown in Fig. 3). Fig. 3 shows the
spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) as a function of wavelength, for
various nanoparticle diameters. It could be noted that there are five
lines in the graph and they are overlapping each other. The graph
shows the same spectral absorption coefficient for different sizes
of the nanoparticles.
On the other hand, the spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) is
strongly dependent on the mass fraction of nanoparticles. Fig. 4
shows the absorption coefficient of the nanofluid as function of
wavelength for different values of with mass fraction. To draw
Fig. 4, different values of mass fraction (20, 40, 60, 80 and
100 mg/l) have been substituted in Eq. (4) while keeping the diam-
eter of the nanoparticle constant (D = 20 nm). From Fig. 4, it could
be noted that the absorption coefficient is increasing with the
increase of mass fraction of nanoparticles. From the Fig. 4 it is also
seen that the absorption coefficient is maximum at 305 nm, which
is in the visible spectrum of the light. When the diameter of the
nanoparticles is small as compare to the wavelength of the light
i.e. b ¼ pD=k << 1 the nanoparticles can be assumed to interact
with the radiations according to the Rayleigh scattering regime
[36]. If the higher order terms in Eq. (3) are neglected (since
b << 1), then the absorption coefficient increases linearly with
increasing mass fraction of the nanoparticles [27] as shown in
Fig. 4.
 2 
6pfv m
1
K ak ¼ Im 2
k m þ2
Eq. (5) shows that the spectral absorption coefficient of the
nanoparticles is subject to nanoparticles mass fraction (fv) only,
and not the nanoparticles diameter (D).
Experimental study
Nanofluid characterization and preparation
The stability of the nanoparticles in the base fluid is an impor-
tant factor in NAS. From the literature, it has been noticed that
Fig. 3. Spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) versus wavelength for different diam-
eters of nanoparticles.
Please cite this article in press as: Bhalla V, Tyagi H. Solar energy harvesting by cobalt oxide nanoparticles, a nanofluid absorption based system. Sustain-
able Energy Technologies and Assessments (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seta.2017.01.011
Fig. 4. Spectral absorption coefficient (Kak) versus wavelength for different mass
fractions of nanoparticles.
particles submerged within the fluid, experience attractive and
repulsive forces [37]. The attractive forces are Vander waal forces
and the repulsive are electrostatic repulsion forces. The Vander
waal forces tend to coalesce the particles and once the effective
size of the particles become large enough to overcome Brownian
motion, these particles settle down in the solution due to gravity.
However, the repulsive forces act on the particles when the parti-
cles are too close and due to the electrostatic repulsion particles
tend to remain stable in the fluid. The stability in between the par-
ticles can be achieved by (a) physical methods and (b) chemical
methods. In the physical method, ultra sonication or magnetic stir-
ring technique is used to break the soft agglomeration [38], how-
ð5Þ ever, these physical methods may alter the physical properties of
the nanoparticles.
In the chemical methods, the agglomeration can be prevented
primarily by three ways (a) addition of surfactant (b) adjustment
in the pH of the fluid and (c) surface modifications of the nanopar-
ticles. The addition of surfactants in the base fluid increases the
repulsive forces between the nanoparticles, and hence prevent
agglomeration. The pH of the isoelectric point for the nanoparticles
carries no electric charge, therefore, there are no repulsive forces in
between the particles, due to which the particles may agglomerate.
So, it is seen that greater the difference between the pH of nano-
fluid and the pH of the isoelectric point, better will be the disper-
sion of the particles. And finally, by modifying the surface of the
nanoparticles, they can be made more stable [39].
In this study, the agglomeration of the nanoparticles have been
prevented by the addition of surfactant in the base fluid and for the
preparation of nanofluid, following steps have been used:
Step 1: Initially Co3O4 nanoparticles dispersion in the base fluid
(de-ionized water) has been prepared at three different mass frac-
tions, viz. 20 mg/l, 40 mg/l and 60 mg/l.
Step 2: A non ionic surfactant (Triton X-100) has been added to
the above mixture below the critical micelle concentration (CMC).
Step 3: The whole mixture has been sonicated for about 40 min
by a probe-type sonicator for proper dispersion of the particles.
Sonication is used to break the soft agglomeration of the nanopar-
ticles. The ultra sonication aids in forming better dispersion up to
an optimum time and after optimum time, again the agglomera-
tion of nanoparticles starts. For the preparation of our nanofluid
samples optimum sonication time (40 min) has been taken from
Ref. [27].
Step 4: The suspension was later cooled down to the room tem-
perature before carrying out the experiment in order to keep the
initial temperature of nanofluid same for all experimental runs.
 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 5

Fig. 5 shows the image of different mass fractions of nanofluid

compared to water, and as seen in the photograph, the suspensions
do not show any signs of sedimentation even after a period of 24 h.

Experimental set up

The replication of outdoor conditions in the laboratory is very

Fig. 5. Image of cobalt oxide nanofluid samples at different mass fractions (taken
24 h after sonication).
tedious and requires various specialized equipments (such as
tracking system, radiation & wind monitoring systems etc.), hence
in order to have a simplified approach, a specialized light source
(halogen lamp, make Philips, color temperature-3400 K) which
simulates the solar radiation has been used for the experimental
study. The experimental study has been divided into two cases:
(a) Surface based absorption system (SAS) and (b) Nanofluid based
absorption system (NAS) and their schematics are shown in
Fig. 6a and b respectively. Fig. 6a and b illustrate the main compo-
nents of the experimental setup, including Halogen lamp, K type
thermocouples, a short wave filter (SWF) (10 SWF-750B, Newport
optical), and Data acquisition system (DAQ). Before the start of the
experiment, the flux from the lamp has been measured (8.5 W/cm2)
with a optical power meter and thermopile detector (1918-R
and 818P, Newport optical) by keeping short wave filter on the
top of thermopile detector. Short wave filter has been placed over

Fig. 6. Schematic of experimental setup consisting light source, thermocouples, DAQ, short wave filter for (a) selective coating based system (SAS), (b) for nanofluid based
system (NAS), (c) showing the details of thermocouple locations and (d) photograph of the experimental set up.

Please cite this article in press as: Bhalla V, Tyagi H. Solar energy harvesting by cobalt oxide nanoparticles, a nanofluid absorption based system. Sustain-
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6 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

the top the container, so that visible portion of the light reach the
container. It helps in eliminating significant portions of the infra-
red spectrum.
The ‘receiver’ in the present system consists of a cylindrical
glass container, and is chosen because of its low thermal conduc-
tivity (1.4 W/m K) [33]. The selection of the material for receiver
has been considered as an important part since one of the inten-
tions is also reduce the heat losses to the environment form the
sides. Three K type thermocouples are placed across the height of
the container at 8, 16 and 24 mm from the bottom of the container
to measure the spatial temperature in the container along depth.
The exact locations are illustrated with clarity in Fig. 6c. These
thermocouples have been placed near the cylindrical glass con-
tainer wall so that the direct irradiation on the thermocouples
can be avoided. Before using the thermocouples, each of them have
been calibrated with a water bath and after repeated measure-
ments (>5 set for each thermocouple) the uncertainty was found
to be less than 0.5 °C. The temperature output from the thermo-
couples was read directly by a data acquisition system (NI 9213,
National Instruments) and recorded using Lab View 9.0.1 by a
computer.
Experimental procedure
Before conducting the experiments certain preliminary tests
have been performed for different irradiation time (to obtain opti-
mized irradiation time). During these preliminary experiments, it
was observed that after 120 s, boiling of the fluid starts. Hence,
in order to keep the experiment simple and within a single phase
region, 120 s for irradiation of the sample has been chosen. In
the first case (i.e. for selective coating-based systems, SAS) the
selective coating has been placed on the top side of cylinder by
ensuring that it should be in proper contact with the water. The
short wave filter has been placed on the top of the container. This
setup was then irradiated for 120 s using the lamp. In the second
case (i.e. for nanofluid absorption system, NAS), a similar proce-
dure was followed, except that no coating was placed on top of
the container rather the short wave filter has been placed directly
on the top of the container, and the sample was irradiated for
120 s. At the beginning of each experiment the nanofluid has been
cooled to the datum level, so that the initial temperature in each
experiment remains same.
Results and discussions
The performance of the surface absorption system and nano-
fluid absorption system has been studied by illuminating the each
system for 120 s, under identical conditions. To understand the
theory of both systems, it is necessary to understand the tempera-
ture distribution within the system. Fig. 7 depicts the temperature
rise of fluid w.r.t. time at three different locations for both the SAS
and NAS. As can be seen from Fig. 7a, for SAS the highest temper-
ature of the fluid is seen near the absorber plate (see top thermo-
couple) and the temperature falls rapidly along the depth of the
container (see middle and bottom thermocouples). It is due to
the fact that the incident radiation is absorbed by the selective
coating and after heating itself up, the coating conducts heat to
the fluid, which causes high temperature gradient within the con-
tainer as shown in Fig. 7a. Conduction heat transfer is the principal
mechanism for the transfer of the heat from the selective coating to
the fluid, and subsequently within the fluid from top to bottom.
Since the thermal conductivity of the working fluid is very low,
so this process of heating is not very effective.

Fig. 7. Temperature rise of fluid w.r.t time for (a) surface absorption system (SAS), for nanofluid absorption system (NAS) at mass fractions of (b) 20 mg/l, (c) 40 mg/l, and (d)
60 mg/l. Insets shows the temperature gradient of the particular system.

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 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 7

In the case of nanofluid absorption system (NAS), Fig. 7(b)–(d)
shows the temperature rise of nanofluid with time. Fig. 7(b)
depicts that, at low mass fraction (20 mg/l), the temperature differ-
ence between the top and bottom thermocouple is in the range of
10 °C, but with the increase of mass fraction, the temperature dif-
ference between top and bottom thermocouple is increasing see
Fig. 7(c) and (d), to values of about 25 °C and 30 °C respectively.
This is due to the fact that at low mass fraction i.e. 20 mg/l, the
incident flux is being absorbed by the nanofluid throughout the
container (in order words the irradiation is not just absorbed in
the top region of the container, but rather is able to reach almost
till the bottom section of the container). On the contrary, at high
mass fractions (for example at 60 mg/l), the temperature near
the top layer of the nanofluid is higher as compared to the loca-
tions away from the top surface (as shown in Fig. 7(d)), because
at such high mass fractions the attenuation of the incident flux
takes place significantly within the top layer of nanofluid. Table 1
provides the average final temperature of the fluid within the
container along with the initial temperature and the statistical
error. The statistical error due to uncertainty in the repeated

Table 1
Average final temperature of the fluid within the container along with the initial temperature and the statistical error.

Sr. No. Thermocouple Position (y/H) Avg. Temp. (°C)at 120 s Avg. Temp. (°C) at 0 s Avg. Temp. (°C) Difference Sample Size Error (°C)
(a) Surface Absorption System (SAS)
1 Top (1) 56.30 24.12 32.18 5 0.27
2 Middle (0.5) 31.15 24.12 7.03 5 0.28
3 Bottom (0) 27.49 24.14 3.35 5 0.37
(b) Nanofluid Absorption System (NAS) at 20 mg/l
1 Top (1) 51.92 24.70 27.22 5 0.33
2 Middle (0.5) 44.85 24.70 20.15 5 0.39
3 Bottom (0) 41.25 24.70 16.55 5 0.40
(c) Nanofluid Absorption System (NAS) at 40 mg/l
1 Top (1) 61.10 24.06 37.04 5 0.33
2 Middle (0.5) 44.10 24.06 20.04 5 0.28
3 Bottom (0) 36.36 24.06 12.30 5 0.40
(d) Nanofluid Absorption System (NAS) at 60 mg/l
1 Top (1) 64.33 24.36 39.97 5 0.50
2 Middle (0.5) 42.13 24.36 17.77 5 0.17
3 Bottom (0) 33.64 24.36 9.28 5 0.2

Fig. 8. Thermal images of (a) surface absorption based system (SAS), of nanofluid absorption system (NAS) at mass fractions of (b) 20 mg/l, (c) 40 mg/l, and (d) 60 mg/l.

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8 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

measurement of temperature has been calculated by student-t
method at 95% confidence level.
To understand this phenomena of heating, thermal images of
the cylindrical glass container have also been taken as shown in
Fig. 9. Comparing average temperatures for surface absorption system (SAS) and
Nanofluid absorption system (NAS).
Fig. 8. Fig. 8(a) shows the thermal image for the SAS, in which
the highest temperature is on the top surface of the cylinder and
the lowest temperature is at the bottom of the cylinder. In the sim-
ilar way, we can see that in 20 mg/l the highest temperature is on
the top of the cylinder but there has a good temperature at the bot-
tom of the cylinder too, which shows that the incident flux is
reaching to the bottom of the cylinder and heating the nanofluid.
When we are increasing the nanoparticles concentration, the tem-
perature in the nanofluid is almost similar to the SAS as it can be
seen in Fig. 8(d).
In case of NAS, the attenuation of the light takes place due to
absorption and scattering, when it travels through the fluid. Math-
ematically it is expressed as
@Ik
¼
ðK ak þ K sk Þy ¼
K ek y ð6Þ
@y
where K ak is the spectral absorption coefficient, K sk is the spectral
scattering coefficient and K ek is the spectral extinction coefficient.
The spectral extinction coefficient is the combination of spectral
absorption and spectral scattering coefficient.
For this experimental study, the nanoparticles mass fraction is
not more than 3680 mg/l, the samples can be regarded as indepen-
dent of scattering. Therefore, the attenuation of the incident light
in the nanofluid is predominantly due to absorption by the
nanoparticles and mathematically it is expressed as

Table 2
Comparison of average temperatures for Surface absorption system and Nanofluid absorption system (NAS).

S. No. Mass fraction (mg/l) Type of system (SAS or NAS) Taverage
Tambient (°C) Error at 95% confidence level
1 0 SAS 14.09 0.12 (°C)
2 20 NAS 21.41 0.32 (°C)
3 40 NAS 23.39 0.34 (°C)
4 60 NAS 22.45 0.18 (°C)

Fig. 10. Comparison of (a) current experimental study with (b) Khullar et al. (2014) [30] and (c) Xuan et al. (2014) [41].

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 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx 9

@Ik
¼
K ak y ð7Þ
@y

where K ak is the spectral absorption coefficient.

Fig. 9 and Table 2 compares the average temperature rise of the
surface absorption system (SAS) and nanofluid absorption system
(NAS). The trend of temperature rise for NAS shows that this sys-
tem is highly dependent on the mass fraction of nanoparticles.
Increasing the particles mass fraction increases the attenuation of
the flux passing through the fluid. The attenuation varies exponen-
tially with the extinction coefficient and hence also with the mass
fraction. So there has an optimum mass fraction where the temper-
ature rise is maximum. And the results indicate that addition of a
lot of nanoparticles is beneficial up to optimum mass fraction,
which in the current setup is about 40 mg/l.
The statistical error due to uncertainty in the repeated measure-
ment of temperature has been calculated by using the temperature
measurement standard deviation multiplied by the student-t
method at 95% confidence level [40], and has been shown in
Table 2.
The significant result of the present study is that at the opti-
mum mass fraction the temperature rise is much higher for the
NAS (an average temperature rise of about 23.39 °C) as compared
to the SAS (an average temperature rise of about 14.09 °C). From
this fact, the nanofluid absorption systems (NAS) show promise
for better & more efficient harnessing of the solar energy. The trend
of temperature rise for the current experimental study has been
compared with previous studies as shown in Fig. 10. The compar-
ison shows that the slope of temperature rise increases with the
increase of mass/volume fraction of nanoparticles, reaches to an
optimum value of mass/volume fraction where the temperature
rise is maximum and then the slope of temperature rise starts
decreasing with further enhancement of mass/volume fraction.
This trend of temperature rise extremely dependent of the material
of nanoparticles, the geometry of the receiver and the magnitude
of the irradiation.

Comparison of experiment with numerical model for nanofluid

absorption system

Fig. 11 shows the comparison of the temperature rise for

Co3O4 based nanofluid studied in the cylindrical glass container.
A 1-dimensional numerical model has been developed to investi-
gate the temperature rise in stationary volumetric receiver. Tran-
sient heat conduction has been studied in this model and it has
been assumed that there is not significant natural convection
inside the container (because it’s a case ‘where the top has higher
temperature than the bottom, preventing an buoyancy driven
flows). The equations used to solve the numerical model are
taken from Ref. [23]. To predict the temperature profiles, the
numerical model has been solved using halogen lamp as the input
radiation. In the experiment, a short wave filter has been used, so
for the numerical model the optical properties of the nanofluid
has been taken accordingly. In the numerical model, the number
of nodes and the nodal positions are taken according to the ther- Fig. 11. Experimental and numerical temperature rise for Co3O4 based nanofluid
mocouples positions in the container. During the numerical studied in the cylindrical container for different mass fractions of (a) 20 mg/l, (b)
40 mg/l, and (c) 60 mg/l. At each mass fraction the temperature rise has been shown
model the optical properties of Co3O4 nanoparticles have been at three different locations – (top, middle and bottom), which correspond to the
taken from Ref. [35]. The main deviation between numerical thermocouple locations (similar to the ones shown in Fig. 6c).
and experimental results is observed in high mass fractions
(60 mg/l). The experimental results shows large temperature gra-
dient than that of model. The main cause for this variation is that Conclusion
in the modeling the particle size is considered to be very small,
however during the experiments the particles may be large in The present study highlights the fact that in the absence of con-
size (due to factors such as agglomeration), which can influence vective heat transfer, the photo-thermal effect of surface absorp-
the results. tion system (SAS) is low. On the other hand, the absorption of

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10 V. Bhalla, H. Tyagi / Sustainable Energy Technologies and Assessments xxx (2017) xxx–xxx
incident irradiation and its subsequent conversion to thermal
energy can be achieved more efficiently with the nanofluid absorp-
tion system (NAS). Furthermore, this work proposes the applica-
tion of Cobalt oxide (Co3O4) based nanofluid absorption system
for efficient conversion of radiative heat flux into useful thermal
energy over that of surface absorption based system. The study
predicts optimal range of mass fraction of nanoparticles (40 mg/l)
where rise in average temperature above ambient condition takes
place; primarily due to significant increase in absorption of radia-
tion. Overall the study shows that the nanofluid absorption system
is advantageous over the surface absorption based system.
Acknowledgment
The authors (V.B. and H.T.) wish to acknowledge the support
provided by School of Mechanical, Materials and Energy Engineer-
ing at IIT Ropar. H.T. also acknowledges the support provided by
DST-SERB and Indo-US Science and Technology Forum (IUSSTF).
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