Thermal-Electric Conversion Efficiency of the Dish/AMTEC Solar Thermal Power System in Wind Condition
The dish/AMTEC solar thermal power system is a newly proposed solar energy utilization system that enables the direct thermal-electric conversion. The performance of the solar dish/AMTEC system in wind condition has been theoretically evaluated in addition to that of no-wind condition. Results show that, the variation of the overall efficiency of dish/AMTEC system with the operating temperature in wind condition is very similar to that of no-wind condition. The difference is that, the maximum overall efficiency of the dish/AMTEC system reduces from 20.6% in no-wind condition to 19.0% in the wind condition. Furthermore, the overall efficiency of dish/AMTEC system decreases with increasing wind speed, while the wind direction shows almost no or little effect.