A Brief Review of Active Solar Tracking System

Abstract

Solar energy is abundantly available in Nature and is one of the cleanest sources. It can be collected using photovoltaic cells. solar concentrators and solar cookers etc. But the conventional fixed systems are not efficient and energy collected by them is intermittent in nature. This drawback can be overcome by introducing solar tracking systems for solar energy concentrators. In this paper some sensor based solar tracking systems have been reviewed and studied thoroughly. Working components, peculiarities have been studied and statistical data has been analysed. Advantages and Disadvantages are also discussed and possible sources of errors have been stated. As compared to the conventional fixed systems 20-40% increase in energy collection is observed for sensor-based tracking systems. Some chronological and Gear drive and chain drive-based systems have also been reviewed thoroughly.