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Parabolic trough collectors focus insolation on receiver tubes to generate electricity in downstream steam cycles. Currently, commercially already established collector modules consist of spatial steel frameworks supporting mirror elements point-wise. The crucial disadvantage hereof is the separation between supporting and reflecting structure. To overcome this drawback, a yet small-scale but continuous concrete shell prototype, that combines both tasks, has been manufactured. It consists of a single thin-walled shell made from highstrength concrete with a thickness of 20 to 30 millimeters only. Tests have proven a considerable optical efficiency of the prototype developed in a cooperation of the universities of Bochum and Kaiserslautern in Germany. In line with current trends to reduce costs by economy of scale, an up-scaled structure based on the prototype, but having an aperture of 10 x 30 m and a hollow cross-section, is now aimed for. To account for the specific action effects on such structures, like wind loads and temperature, an initial numerical model has been set up. Employing topology optimization techniques delivers an optimally balanced model candidate with respect to mass and stiffness iteratively. Structural parts that require low densities only are identified and substituted by hollow shapes of simple geometry. That way, the total structure is subdivided into appropriate substructures according to the flux of inner forces along with a significant weight-reduction. Obviously, the emerging partial segments defined by the substructures have to be designed for stability. Accompanying experimental studies of micro-meshed reinforced high-strength concrete elements prove both general feasibility and also manufacturing.

SLENDER LARGE-SCALE PARABOLIC TROUGHS USING SHAPE-OPTIMIZED HOLLOW STRUCTURES MADE OF HIGH-STRENGTH CONCRETE