Abstract
The performance of photovoltaic panels decreases depending on the different factors to which they are subjected daily. One of the phenomena that most affects their energy production is dust deposition. This is particularly acute in desert climates, where the level of solar radiation is extreme. In this work, the effect of dust soiling is examined on the electricity generation of an experimental photovoltaic pilot plant, installed at the Solar Energy Research Center (CIESOL) at the University of Almería. An average reduction of 5% of the power of a photovoltaic plant due to dust contamination has been obtained, this data being used to simulate the economic effect in plants of 9 kWp and 1 and 50 MWp. The economic losses have been calculated, and are capable of being higher than 150,000 €/year in industrial plants of 50 MWp. A cleaning strategy has also been presented, which represents a substantial economic outlay over the years of plant operation.
Highlights
To supply the global energy demanded and considering increasing over the few years due to population growth and technological developments, a high percentage of this energy demand is covered by non-renewable energy
A pair of curves taken from clear days in different months are presented to analyze the variation in the characteristic parameters throughout the acquisition campaign
This work presents a methodology developed to determine the energy and economic losses This work presents a methodology developed to determine the energy and economic losses associated with dust pollution in an area that has an excellent solar resource, but which can be influenced associated with dust pollution in an area that has an excellent solar resource, but which can be by the presence of dust particles in the atmosphere
Summary
To supply the global energy demanded and considering increasing over the few years due to population growth and technological developments, a high percentage of this energy demand is covered by non-renewable energy. Generating fossil fuel-based energy to meet such energy demand is not sustainable because, at some point, it will prove insufficient. Every hour the sun emits enough energy to meet the annual global energy demand [2]. These properties make solar energy an ideal resource for fulfilling the growing global energy requirements, as presented in [3], where the authors analyze the economic viability of developing large-scale photovoltaic solar energy projects in Spain, with outputs between 100 and
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