Abstract
The influence of installation and environmental parameters on dust particle deposition behavior on solar photovoltaic collectors were investigated using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation. Parameters including tilt, height of installation, dust particle size and wind speed were investigated. Modeling of wind flow on the building and the photovoltaic array was achieved using the Shear Stress Transport k-ω turbulence model. The discrete phase model was adopted for dust motion prediction and a model was developed to assess the impact of dust accumulation on the performance of the photovoltaic array. The study revealed that rooftop installations have less dust deposition unlike the ground-mounted installations. The wind flow characteristics on rooftop installations are greatly affected by the building while on ground mounted installations wind flow is only influenced by the tilt of the solar photovoltaic collector. Different tilt angles, wind speeds and particle sizes had different deposition characteristics. The lower impact velocities experienced on ground mounted Photovoltaic (PV) arrays resulted in more deposition for smaller sized (10µm) dust particles compared to the larger sized (50µm and 150µm) particles. On rooftop installations, dust particle size of 150µm had the most deposition at a velocity of 5m/s and hence it resulted in a 22.61% reduction in solar photovoltaic efficiency while the least reduction in efficiency of 1.32% was recorded at 15m/s and 10µm size dust particles. The tilt angles of 0o and 22.5o had large sized turbulent eddies compared to the tilt of 45o. The study revealed that ground mounted photovoltaic arrays had more dust deposition compared to rooftop mounted photovoltaics.
Highlights
Solar energy is a developing alternative source of clean energy which has been in the picture for some decades
The influence of different particle sizes, wind speeds and tilt angles were investigated in this study using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)
Wind flow characteristics were predicted by solving the Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) equations with the turbulence model Stress Transport (SST) kω being used to resolve wind flow turbulence in the vicinity of the PV collector
Summary
Solar energy is a developing alternative source of clean energy which has been in the picture for some decades. It is rapidly growing with more than 50% market growth rate for solar PV in 2016 and more than 75 GW of solar photovoltaic (PV) installed worldwide [1,2,3,4]. In a study by Pavan et al [11], which was done to evaluate fouling power losses, it was reported that for poly-crystalline PV modules power losses of between 1% and 5% are expected within a year of operation. Adinoyi and Said [13] investigated fouling effects on PV collectors in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern region for a period of six months and they recorded 50% power loss due to fouling
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary 
Published Version (
Free)
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
