Improved in situ performance testing of line-concentrating solar collectors: Comprehensive uncertainty analysis for the selection of measurement instrumentation

Accurate and complete performance evaluation is playing a major role in the further development of concentrating solar collectors. To ensure dependable test results, an appropriate testing and evaluation procedure is required. Moreover, the selection and installation of suitable measurement instrumentation are essential for obtaining reliable data for the performance evaluation. The quality of the measurement instrumentation greatly influences the representativeness of the test results. Details on the measurement instrumentation recommended for the testing of low-temperature solar collectors have already been provided in the testing standard EN ISO 9806:2013. Due to the larger dimensions of concentrating collectors and thus different working temperatures and mass flow rates, these recommendations cannot be directly applied for the testing of concentrating solar collectors.