Study on the performance of a novel photovoltaic/thermal system combining photocatalytic and organic photovoltaic cells

Abstract

Organic photovoltaic cells compensate for the decline in the electrical efficiency of photovoltaic cells as temperatures rise. Photocatalytic technology solves the problem of low utilization of ultraviolet photons by photovoltaic thermal systems. Therefore, this paper proposes a photovoltaic thermal system that combines photocatalytic technology and organic photovoltaic cells, which combines power generation, air purification and domestic hot water. In this study, a heat and mass transfer model is established for the novel system and the thermal, electrical and air purification performance of the system under different working conditions are studied. The results show that with the increase of solar radiation and ambient temperature, the electrical and thermal efficiencies of the system are increasing. The maximum instantaneous thermal efficiency of the system can reach 65% and the electrical efficiency can reach 17.7%. The higher the temperature of the inlet water stream, the lower the thermal efficiency of the system, but the electrical efficiency of the system is elevated. The increase of solar radiation is beneficial to photocatalytic degradation of formaldehyde, but the increase of relative humidity in the air hinders the photocatalytic reaction, and the photocatalytic efficiency decreases significantly when the relative humidity exceeds 0.5. The maximum formaldehyde single-pass efficiency of the system is 60%, which can produce 675 m3 of clean air per day. The novel PC-OPV/T system provides theoretical guidance for the application of PV/T in high-temperature fields and air purification.