Cost-Effective Snow Removal from Solar Panels

Abstract

Part of annual solar energy contribution into global consumption of electricity consist of impressive 1%. At the same time, some northern countries with prolonged winters have little interest in usage of solar energy. In many countries actively pursuing installation of solar panels for individual and commercial usage the number of snow days is significant. This motivated us to develop hardware and cost-effective operational steps for removal of snow whenever it is needed. We designed a simple hardware and developed sequence of steps to heat up solar panels and melt the snow accumulated on surfaces of panels. When solar panels are forward biased, they dissipate heat equal to the Voc of a panel times current going through it. Commercial solar panels are rated to handle at least 10A of current through them, so heat dissipation that can be safely achieved by forward biasing a solar panel can reach around 400W without causing any damage. Our experiments both in outdoor setting as well as in a freezer condition showed that with this method, solar panels can be heated up from -5°C to 5°C in 8-12 minutes. Due to the fact that the solar panel itself is used for snow removal and minimum additional equipment is required, a commercial application of this system might promise cost-effective solution for snow removal. Our system is setup such that it uses line AC voltage to melt several panels in series and manages half-wave cycles such that bypass diodes of solar panels are not used in parasitic energy dissipation. DC alternatives were also considered, however, were found to be cost ineffective.