In: Mechanical Engineering
In class, we learned that ”most” of the sun’s radiation happens in the band 0.2 ? ? ? 3µm, and Stephen asked what ”most” means. What proportion of solar radiation (for a black body sun) falls in the above wavelength range. Similarly, what proportion of the Earth’s radiation (black body Earth at 290K) occurs in the wavelength band 4 ? ? ? 40µm? What wavelength range contains the middle 95% of the sun’s radiation?
1. Given that T = 5778 K, (for a blackbody sun)
?1T = 0.2 * 5778 = 1156 ?mK and ?2T = 3 * 5778 = 17334 ?mK
the blackbody radiation functions are determined from Table 11-12 , (Introduction to Thermodynamics and Heat Transfer, Yunus A. Cengel)
f ?1 = 0.00173514 f ?2 = 0.97851368
Then the fraction of radiation emitted between these two wavelengths becomes
f ?2 - f ?1 = 0. 97851368– 0. 00173514= 0.9768 ? 97.68%
2. Given that T = 290 K, (for a blackbody earth)
?1T = 4 * 290 = 1160 ?mK and ?2T = 40 * 290 = 11600 ?mK
the blackbody radiation functions are determined from Table 11-12 , (Introduction to Thermodynamics and Heat Transfer, Yunus A. Cengel)
f ?1 = 0.001714 f ?2 = 0.9409868
Then the fraction of radiation emitted between these two wavelengths becomes
f ?2 - f ?1 = 0. 9409868– 0. 001714= 0.9393 ? 93.93%
3. Let the range for this 95% radiation be 0 ?m to ? ?m
thus, f ?2 - f ?1 = 0. 95 i.e., f ?2 – 0 = 0.95 i.e., f ?2 = 0.95
from the table 11-2, for 0.95
?2T = 12488 ?mK
?2*5778 = 12488
?2 = 2.16 ?m
thus, 95% of the radiation has a range of 2.16 ?m