Abstract
The exploitation of renewable energy sources and specifically photovoltaic (PV) devices have been showing significant growth; however, for a more effective development of this technology it is essential to have higher energy conversion performances. PV producers often declare a higher efficiency respect to real conditions and this deviation is mainly due to the difference between nominal and real temperature conditions of the PV. In order to improve the solar cell energy conversion efficiency many authors have proposed a methodology to keep the temperature of a PV system lower: a modified crystalline PV system built with a normal PV panel coupled with a Phase Change Material (PCM) heat storage device. In this paper a thermal model analysis of the crystalline PV-PCM system based on a theoretical study using finite difference approach is described. The authors developed an algorithm based on an explicit finite difference formulation of energy balance of the crystalline PV-PCM system. Two sets of recursive equations were developed for two types of spatial domains: a boundary domain and an internal domain. The reliability of the developed model is tested by a comparison with data coming from a test facility. The results of numerical simulations are in good agreement with experimental data.
Highlights
The intense exploitation of fossil fuels has caused an increase in the concentration of carbon dioxide from 280 to 370 ppm and a consequent estimated global warming from 0.4 to 0.8 °C [1]
The crystalline PV-Phase Change Material (PCM) system above described was monitored during the summer season, when the system is subjected to the higher solar irradiance values, because we want verify the reliability of the proposed calculation algorithm
The heat exchange between the crystalline PV-PCM system and the surrounding environment is governed by several variables such as the thermo-physical properties of all the materials making up the system, the geometry, the weather conditions, the heat transfer coefficients
Summary
The intense exploitation of fossil fuels has caused an increase in the concentration of carbon dioxide from 280 to 370 ppm and a consequent estimated global warming from 0.4 to 0.8 °C [1]. A key element of a wider dissemination of PV systems is represented by high power conversion efficiency Concerning this point, the energy produced by a PV cell depends, apart from materials, on other two important parameters: the amount of the incident radiation and the temperature of the PV cell. This application has recently been suggested by other authors that have carried out some numerical studies. In order to validate the numerical model, we performed a comparison with data derived by a real-time monitoring apparatus
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