Session: 02-04: Building Performance Analysis and Simulation

Paper Number: 132059

132059 - Use of Solar Hybrid Community Cooking System for Community Kitchens Serving 100-200 Meals/Day 

Abstract: 

The Concentrated Solar Thermal (CST) technology is primarily used for community cooking and process heat application in the 105-150 °C range. Boiling-type cooking processes like rice, lentils, and curries typically operate in the 105-125 °C range and are adopted for CST-based heat source cooking. This boiling-type cooking process consumes 60-70 % of the total cooking energy in a community kitchen. There are credible installations for the use of CST technology for community cooking above 1000 meals /day. Many community kitchens serve 100-200 meals /day for schools, serving mid-day meals, industrial canteens and cafeterias, special residential schools for the disabled, etc. The CST systems are not feasible for small installations due to a) limited availability of flat roofs, b) high distribution losses for working fluid (steam / hot water) as high as 30-40% heat generation, and c) poor return on investment.

For a community kitchen at a tribal residential school in Gujarat, India, a solar hybrid system integrating solar thermal and solar Photovoltaic (PV) has been implemented for cooking meals for 80 tribal children. Solar hybrid steam-based cooking system involves generating steam using a combination of solar thermal and photovoltaic energy sources. The energy generated from solar thermal and solar PV systems is stored in a pressurized hot water vessel having a maximum saturation temperature of 150 °C at 4 bar (g) saturation pressure. During the cooking process, steam is produced by flashing pressurized hot water to atmospheric pressure. The steam generated is directed to energy-efficient cooking vessels equipped with steam jackets and insulation.

The thermal energy storage system is one of the crucial aspects of this project; the pressurized hot water vessel is an adequately insulated sensible heat storage device. The solar thermal system provides hot water up to 80 °C, and solar PV-based electrical heaters boost the temperature further up to a saturation temperature of 150 °C at 4 bar (g) saturation pressure.

The expected savings from the solar hybrid cooking system is about USD 2500 / year for 250 days of operation in a year, with an order investment of USD 12000. The system's potential reduction in carbon footprint will be approximately 4.96 tons of CO2 per year. The core objective of such integration is to provide nutritious and hygienic meals to the students while reducing the cost of operation and the carbon footprint through solar hybrid technology.

 

Content table for the conference paper

•           Introduction

•           Community cooking sector in India

•           CST for community cooking

•           Proposed technology

•           Solar thermal and PV system thermal integration

•           Pressurized hot water storage system

•           Operation of the system

•           Pilot system experimentation and results

•           Techno-economic and carbon footprint assessment

•           Conclusion

Presenting Author: Vikrant Katekar Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India

Presenting Author Biography: Vikrant is currently pursuing a PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai, India. He studies rural technologies, solar energy collection and applications, solar distillation, energy conversion, and essential oil extraction using renewable energies.
In the past, she established the first Solar Thermal Laboratory at CSIR - National Chemical Laboratory (NCL); under this, she has designed systems to demonstrate direct steam generation using solar thermal concentrator technologies (CPC and parabolic dish) for various process heat applications. She has developed and installed a solar thermal community cooking system at the NCL canteen.

The doctoral and post-doctoral research was focused on an understanding of the hydrodynamics of multiphase flow systems. The work encompasses designing and developing the experimental setup, defining the experimental protocol, conducting measurements, and implementing a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model for experimental data.

She authored over 15 international journal papers and presented at 6 international and 8 national conferences.

Authors:

Rezeena Chinthamalla IIT Bombay
Madhavi Sardeshpande Sarvaay Solutions LLP
Vishal Sardeshpande IIT Bombay
Neeraj Kumbhakarna IIT Bombay