Introduction

This repository contains the wrappers for running the Solstice ray-tracing software.

(The development is in progress ...)

Solstice Installation

• In Linux system (e.g. Ubuntu 16.04):

wget 'https://www.meso-star.com/projects/solstice/downloads/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64.tar.gz'
tar xzf ~/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64.tar.gz
rm ~/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64.tar.gz

• In Windows system (e.g. Windows 10, 64-bit):

  (coming soon ... )

Running the wrapper scripts in this repository

• In Linux system (e.g. Ubuntu 16.04):

(1) download the repository and save it in the Solstice directory, e.g.

~/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64

or clone the develop branch in the Solstice directory

git clone https://github.com/anustg/solstice-scripts.git
git checkout develop

(2) Setup the python source scripts

cd ~/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64
sudo python setup.py install

(3) Initialisation

3.1 initialise the Solstice directory in the '.\runSolstice\run.py' Python script

cd ~/Solstice-0.8.2-GNU-Linux64/runSolstice
gedit run.py

Set the 'solstice_dir' = 'your Solstice directory'

3.2 Define the simulation case

gedit set_case.py

The set_case.py is the script that initialises the Solstice directory, casefolder, detailed parameters of the case: (I) the sun, (II) the field, (III) the target  

-- the example case is a solar tower system, including a heliostat field and a billboard receiver       

-- the example parameters are the case C1.1 in Wang et al., 2019 (in progress), for verification purposes

-- users are welcome to define their own test cases by changing these parameters

(4) Run

python run.py

(5) Visualise the results in Paraview, e.g.

~/ParaView-5.6.0-MPI-Linux-64bit/bin/paraview 

Reference

• Solstice: https://www.meso-star.com/projects/solstice/solstice.html
• Wang, Y., Potter, D., Asselineau, C.-A., Corsi, C., Wagner, M., Caliot, C., Piaud, B., Blanco, M., Kim, J.-S., Pye, J., 2019. Verification of Optical Modeling on Sunshape and Surface Slope Error. Solar Energy – in progress