Impact of Natural Cleaning With Rain in a Linear Fresnel Solar Field for Process Heat
- 1Universitat Politècnica de València
Abstract
Dirt on the mirrors of a concentrated solar collector reduces the absorbed thermal power and, thus, the amount of heat produced. This implies periodic cleaning and additional water consumption to ensure a good performance. Most existing cleaning strategies involve manually cleaning mirrors with pressurized water or using cleaning vehicles, which entail additional maintenance costs and reduce the system's profitability. In this work, a simple cleaning strategy, consisting of cleaning the mirrors with rainwater, is proposed and tested in a facility with a Linear Fresnel solar field. For this purpose, a rain sensor was installed. When it rains within a specific threshold, the mirrors are tilted so rainwater naturally cleans the dirt. To quantify the effect of this cleaning strategy, the evolution of the mirror's reflectance was measured with a portable reflectometer in two campaigns: one with no cleaning and one with the rainwater cleaning strategy. In addition, the evolution of the mirror’s reflectance has been correlated, including a term that decreases reflectance with operating hours and another that increases reflectance when the mirrors are cleaned with rainwater.
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BibTeX
@article{lasartepamplo2026impact,
title = {{Impact of Natural Cleaning With Rain in a Linear Fresnel Solar Field for Process Heat}},
author = {Alicia Lasarte-Pampló and Antonio Cazorla-Marín and Jorge Payá and Alejandro López},
journal = {SolarPACES Conference Proceedings},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
url = {https://www.tib-op.org/ojs/index.php/solarpaces/article/view/2972},
note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Impact of Natural Cleaning With Rain in a Linear Fresnel Solar Field for Process Heat
AU - Alicia Lasarte-Pampló
AU - Antonio Cazorla-Marín
AU - Jorge Payá
AU - Alejandro López
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/23
JO - SolarPACES Conference Proceedings
UR - https://www.tib-op.org/ojs/index.php/solarpaces/article/view/2972
AB - Dirt on the mirrors of a concentrated solar collector reduces the absorbed thermal power and, thus, the amount of heat produced. This implies periodic cleaning and additional water consumption to ensure a good performance. Most existing cleaning strategies involve manually cleaning mirrors with pressurized water or using cleaning vehicles, which entail additional maintenance costs and reduce the system's profitability. In this work, a simple cleaning strategy, consisting of cleaning the mirrors with rainwater, is proposed and tested in a facility with a Linear Fresnel solar field. For this purpose, a rain sensor was installed. When it rains within a specific threshold, the mirrors are tilted so rainwater naturally cleans the dirt. To quantify the effect of this cleaning strategy, the evolution of the mirror's reflectance was measured with a portable reflectometer in two campaigns: one with no cleaning and one with the rainwater cleaning strategy. In addition, the evolution of the mirror’s reflectance has been correlated, including a term that decreases reflectance with operating hours and another that increases reflectance when the mirrors are cleaned with rainwater.
SN - 2751-9899
ER -