Experimental and numerical study of parabolic trough solar collector of MicroSol-R tests platform

The analysis shows that simpler (1D) and less complex (2D) models are useful for predicting the overall thermal performance of the PTC. However, the complex model (3D) is the most accurate and it is able to provide in-depth information about the actual distribution of heat flux on the receiver tube, which is the limitation of the other models.