The solar field is the totality of the collectors of a power plant and their arrangement on the power plant ground

The solar field is the totality of the collectors of a power plant and their arrangement on the power plant ground. In this section we will describe the arrangement and the size of the solar field of direct steam generation PTPP.
The solar field of these DSG of PTC power plants has a rectangular structure. In many cases, the power block is located near the center of the solar field. This arrangement allows that the pipes are as short as possible in order to reduce heat energy losses; the way of the hot heat transfer medium to the power block becomes shorter.
The following figure shows the system layout of DSG of PTC.
The collector rows are composed of solar collector assemblies. A solar collector assembly is a
combination of several collector modules (contain between 8 and 12 modules) that are tracked by one common driving unit.
Concerning the distance between the collector rows, it should neither be too small nor too big. If it is
too small, then the shading between the rows increases too much. If the distance is too large, then the
pipes become long and the thermal losses as well as the investment costs increase. A good distance
between the rows is about three times the aperture width.