Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping Research Articles

Techno-Economic Analysis of Solar Powered Water Pumping System

Analytical study of solar photovoltaic water pumping system can be performed on the basis of technical, economical and environmental phenomenon. Use of solar energy to generate off grid electric power has been enhanced in these days and it is continuously increasing day to day due to the active interest of government and people. Numbers of applications are available in the solar energy field and amongst its various applications solar photovoltaic water pumping system is best utilized for agriculture and community water supply. It has increased agriculture productivity due to the power availability when needed for irrigation. This technology has improved the living standard of farmers and villagers who have not proper electrical supply as per their requirement for water pumping. This technology is helping to complete the mission of government and helps farmers to get water pumping system without any need of grid connection. The use of fossil fuels was common earlier for the pumping system and mostly diesel generator based systems are used which causes emission of CO2 and other harmful gases. Fossil fuels increase pollution and causes global warming, health problems and many more while solar energy based applications are helping to reduce CO2 emission and making a step toward green environment. This manuscript presents study of technical and economic analysis of solar water pumping system useful for various water supply applications especially in agriculture sector.

Energy and Water Needs Analysis: Towards Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping in Rural Areas of Malawi

Water and energy are both major challenges in rural areas of developing countries, including in the sub-Saharan Africa Region. This study assessed water and energy needs, challenges, and costs in order to produce a body of knowledge and further explore ways in which the water-energy synergies could be utilised. A mixed-mode survey method consisting of questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, observations and focus group discussions involving participants in the rural areas of Chiradzulu District in Malawi was employed. The study findings show that water access is generally inadequate, caused by high population, low yield, disparity in the distribution of water sources, and non-functionality. Using the contingent valuation method, logistic regression showed the only predictor of willingness to pay for drinking water was income and the predictors to pay for irrigation water were occupation, age and household size. Sustainable energy access was also found lacking for cooking and basic energy services such as for lighting, mobile charging and for radios. Biomass remains the main source of cooking energy, whereas battery powered torches have replaced paraffin for lighting. Overall, the household survey results imply that there is need for more sustainable water and energy provision. To address both challenges, the study recommends solar PV water pumping systems which can be designed in such a way that they can be simultaneously used for providing basic energy services. Further research is needed to address cooking energy choices.

Review of PV fed water pumping systems using BLDC Motor

Energy demand is increasing significantly nowadays due to increase in population, industrialization and transportation. The fossil fuel depletion is high with this increase in energy demand. There are sincere efforts from around the world to tap renewable sources and adopt these sources of energy for their social and economic development. Among all the available renewable energy sources solar energy is regarded as the most viable source of energy. Solar water pumping systems are receiving wide attention in agricultural and industrial sector as they are environment friendly and require no fuel cost. Conventional water pumps run by electricity tend to be unreliable and diesel pumps have increased fuel cost. Main objective of this study is to present a comprehensive literature review of Solar Photovoltaic fed water pumping system using Brushless DC(BLDC)Motor. BLDC motor emerges as a better substitute for DC motors and AC Induction Motors in water pumping applications due to high efficiency, high reliability and least maintenance requirement. The review focuses on research findings of solar photovoltaic water pumping systems using BLDC motor drives with and without dc-dc converters.

Design optimization of solar PV water pumping system

Abstract Utilization of solar photovoltaic (PV) as a power source in water pumping applications has emerged as one of the valuable solar applications. Solar PV water pumping system is used to fulfill the demand of water in the field of irrigation, livestock watering, and village water supply. Understanding of system design and selection of appropriate design parameters are essential to attain consistent and economical performance of any system. To design a solar water pumping system collection of the information regarding the system components and local climate data of the location are required. This information helps to obtain preferred design and results. In the present paper design optimization of PV system is done by simulation software tool PVsyst 5.52. This simulation software helps to design the system and shows how the different parameters affect the system performance results. Selection of PV array, controller, pumping unit, water supply network is needful to fulfill design requirements. The performance evaluation of a system located at Karansar, Jaipur (Rajasthan) is done with help of simulation software by using existing local data. The theoretical and simulation results are used to understand the system design and its performance by taking different parameters into consideration.

Study and comparison results of the field oriented control for photovoltaic water pumping system applied on two cities in Morocco

In this papier, a low-cost solar photovoltaic water pumping system based on an induction motor without the use of chemical energy storage is presented. In literature, we can find several Maximum Power Point Tracking Algorithms, the choice of the algorithm is according to the nature of application. In this article, Variable Step Size Incremental Conductance MPPT method has been developed since it is fast and has less oscillations. The studied photovoltaic pumping system contains a centrifugal pump which is driven by a three-phase asynchronous motor. To control the water flow, the field-oriented control has been implemented. The control system is applied on two cities with different climatic conditions to evaluate their performance. The photovoltaic pumping system is developed using the MATLAB/Simulink software to discuss the results obtained. Consequently, the proposed MPPT based on the incremental conductance variable step shows good performances in terms of efficiency and tracking speed.

Numerical Performance Evaluation of Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping System under Partial Shading Condition using Modern Optimization

Renewable energy is an attractive solution for water pumping systems particularly in isolated regions where the utility grid is unavailable. An attempt is made to improve the performance of solar photovoltaic water pumping system (SPVWPS) under partial shading condition. Under this condition, the power versus voltage curve has more than one maximum power point (MPP), which makes the tracking of global MPP not an easy task. Two MPP tracking (MPPT) strategies are proposed and compared for tracking MPP of SPVWPS under shading condition. The first method is based on the classical perturb and observe (P&O) and the other method is based on a Salp Swarm Algorithm (SSA). Based on extensive MATLAB simulation, it is found that the SSA method can provide higher photovoltaic (PV) generated power than the P&O method under shading condition. Consequently, the pump flowrate is increased. But, under normal distribution of solar radiation, both MPPT techniques can extract the maximum power but SSA is considered a time-consuming approach. Moreover, SSA is compared with particle swarm optimization (PSO) and genetic algorithm (GA). The obtained results ensure the superiority of SSA compared with PSO and GA. SSA has high successful rate of reaching true global MPP.

Enhancing the Performance of Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping System by Water Cooling Over and Below the Photovoltaic Array

Abstract Lower operating temperatures of the photovoltaic (PV) cells increase the performance and efficiency of any PV installation. The efficiency of solar photovoltaic water pumping system (SPVWPS) decreases considerably with the increase in the PV cell temperature. In this paper, the performance of a 2 hp SPVWPS has been investigated experimentally, for the influence of panel cooling, using water. The experimental observations have been made under climatic conditions of Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology, Nagpur campus, India, during the year 2018. The performance was evaluated under four different cases: (a) without panel cooling, (b) with water cooling on the top of the panel surface, (c) with water cooling on beneath the surface of the panel, and (d) with water cooling beneath the surface of the panel using jute. The effect of different cooling cases on the various performance parameters such as discharge, power output, pump efficiency, and system efficiency has been analyzed and discussed. The results showed that the water cooling on the top of the panel and beneath the surface of the panel with jute has considerable influence on performance enhancement when compared with other cases.

System design of smart solar photovoltaic water pump in Indonesia

Indonesia has a vast agricultural land. However, during the dry season, agricultural land does not get enough water. The problem can be solved by using the abundant amount of solar light during the dry season. It is Smart Solar Photovoltaic Water Pump (SSPWP). This research is system design of SSPWP. It consists of Photovoltaic panel, solar charger control, accumulator, inverter, water pump, mobile phone, and alarm. The working principle of the system is a solar cell in Photovoltaic panel exposes solar light then it produces direct current electricity. It is supplied to the water pump to irrigate farm. This system is connected to a mobile phone so that farmer can control irrigation for their farm automatically. System design consists Electric water Pump 220 Volt AC 200 Watt, with four Photos voltaic panels 12 – 36 Volt 180-Watt Peak Maximum power 720 Watt, and 72 Ampere Hour Battery.

Performance investigations of solar photovoltaic water pumping system using centrifugal deep well pump

Photovoltaic technology is an effective, reliable and rapidly developing technology to convert solar energy into electrical energy. In the recent years, the need and demand of solar photovoltaic water pumping system has been increased as a stand-alone water pumping system to pump water in remote, desolate and mountainous region for end use of livestock watering and rural/urban water supply system. For a required pumping head, photovoltaic array configuration and its size (peak power rating, Wp) affect the flow rate of pumped water, economy and performance of solar photovoltaic water pumping system. The recent work is aimed to study performance of a directly coupled solar photovoltaic water pumping system at different pumping heads (2 bar, 3 bar, 4 bar, and 5 bar) and different photovoltaic array configurations (3S?2P, 4S?2P, 5S?2P, 6S, 7S, and 8S) for the real meteorological conditions of the Vidarbha region, central India (Nagpur). A comparative study has been done to investigate the head effect on the optimum photovoltaic array configuration, pump and pumping system total efficiency by performing experiment on the centrifugal deep well pump (SQF 5A-7), with 6-10 photovoltaic modules (200 W each) with various configurations and different heads. It is concluded that the 4S?2P and 5S?2P configurations are most optimized array to provide optimum energy at all pumping heads.

An Embedded Solar‐Powered Irrigation System Based on a Cascaded Fuzzy Logic Controller

AbstractThis study examines the automatization of irrigation tasks of solar photovoltaic water pumping systems (SPVWPS) in greenhouse applications. A prototype of an embedded control system has been developed for SPVWPS battery‐coupled architectures. The new design aims at improving the safety of solar irrigation facility by avoiding the exhaustion of pumping resources (water and energy) while watering. The availabilities of pumping resources are introduced as new requisite inputs of a fuzzy logic‐based control system (FLC) so that it can produce adequate and safe irrigation durations. The FLC design consists of two cascaded devices. The first device uses climate data to estimate durations for watering that satisfy crop needs. The second device uses actual resource levels to evaluate the pumping capacity of the SPVWPS regarding requested durations. Watering is performed whenever the pumping capacity of the system represents more than 25% of the total requirement. Test results from an experimental greenhouse prove the effectiveness of the decision‐making mechanism that prevents scheduling unsuccessful watering tasks.

Battery Less Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping System using Incremental Conductance Method

Objectives: The work is to improvise the energy efficiency, cost and payback time of solar Photovoltaic water pumping system. Methods/Statistical Analysis: In this proposed work overview of the solar panel is presented, resulting in a Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) technique to improve the efficiency and also to increase the potential of solar plant. The energy efficiency, total cost and payback time are the important aspects in this design. If the numbers of panels are reduced, high gain will be achieved and without batteries, space can be reduced. The incremental conductance based water pumping system without batteries is presented for the domestic purposes and irrigation of small crops. Findings: The proposed system result uses the most extreme intensity of (100 w) condition at a voltage (272.5 v) and simulation results are obtained using MATLAB and Simulink. Application/Improvements: It is a low cost solution and also it requires no additional power equipment. Keywords: Incremental Conductance Method, Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT), Photovoltaic (PV), Solar Array and Buck Converter

Solar Energy as an Alternative for an All Year Round Production of Vegetables in Anambra, Nigeria

Epileptic power supply is a major problem in Nigeria and one of the ways Nigerians have solving this challenge is by using renewable energy as an alternative power supply in place fossil fuels. Among renewable energy sources, solar is the most important because it is available in this part of the world. This energy source is also used in various industries including agriculture and it can be used in irrigation and sprinklers in farmer’s vegetable farm. This research was carried out through field visitations and extensive literature on the performance of photovoltaic modules. This paper outlines the use of solar water pump for irrigation in vegetable farms, the benefits and concludes with suggested recommendations which can help production of vegetables during dry season in Anambra State. It aims at contributing a better understanding of the potential impact of solar photovoltaic (PV) on sustainable production of vegetables with special attention to the effect of income generating activities in the State. It is known that during dry season, vegetables do not get enough water, sometimes these agricultural products are very scarce and expensive. Solar photovoltaic water pumping is found to be economically viable in comparison to electricity or diesel based systems for irrigation and sprinklers in the vegetable farm. Solar photovoltaic water pumping is therefore, an attractive alternative for irrigation and sprinklers in Nigerian vegetable farm due to the huge solar potential in the country.

SOLAR POWERED IRRIGATION SYSTEM FOR TURF AREA

Solar water pumping system may be a competitive application for remote and luxurious areas where power costs a lot. One may argue that solar photovoltaic water pumping systems not only comprises an environmentally friendly solution, but also contributes substantially to the satisfaction of remote communities’ water consumption needs. Therefore, the study aimed to manage pump for sprinkler irrigation system operated by solar power in small area of turf. The required hydraulic experiment and measurements were conducted using Direct-coupled photovoltaic pumping system to operating sprinkler irrigation network at the experimental farm of soil and water Research Department, Nuclear Research Center, located at Inshas, Sharkia Governorate, Atomic Energy Authority, Egypt. The essential idea to operate the sprinkler irrigation system and fulfill the water needs of turf area was to use a locally assembled pump-set to match the photovoltaic generator unsteady output. Results indicated that, solar radiation increased during summer (April and July), so the electric power, pump discharge, pressure head, Hydraulic horsepower (hp) and Photovoltaic conversion efficiency are affected as solar radiation changed. Four mathematical equations has been derived to illustrate the relationship between solar radiation and electric power, pump discharge pressure head , water hp and Photovoltaic conversion efficiency (PVCE) during the day hours.

SOLAR POWERED IRRIGATION SYSTEM FOR TURF AREA

Solar water pumping system may be a competitive application for remote and luxurious areas where power costs a lot. One may argue that solar photovoltaic water pumping systems not only comprises an environmentally friendly solution, but also contributes substantially to the satisfaction of remote communities’ water consumption needs. Therefore, the study aimed to manage pump for sprinkler irrigation system operated by solar power in small area of turf. The required hydraulic experiment and measurements were conducted using Direct-coupled photovoltaic pumping system to operating sprinkler irrigation network at the experimental farm of soil and water Research Department, Nuclear Research Center, located at Inshas, Sharkia Governorate, Atomic Energy Authority, Egypt. The essential idea to operate the sprinkler irrigation system and fulfill the water needs of turf area was to use a locally assembled pump-set to match the photovoltaic generator unsteady output. Results indicated that, for Six sprinklers the hourly, daily average discharge were 3.3, 6.3, 8.3 and 3.9 m3/h at Jan., Apr., Jul., and Oct. respectively at operating pressure 1.8 bar. When the efficiency is 15 % at 11:00 am

An assessment for the selection of weather profiles for performance testing of SPV pumps in Indian climate

The escalated targets for Solar Photovoltaic water pumping system (SPVWPS) installations in many Asian countries resulted in a huge demand for testing and certification of SPV pump samples. Test laboratories involved in testing and certifications are developing a generalized radiation and temperature profiles to cover various climatic conditions such as hot and dry, hot and humid, composite, cold and cloudy. The present paper addresses the challenges in the testing of a SPVWPS, through a step by step approach and devises solar radiation and temperature profile. Three types of testing profiles are designed to simulate “worst to worst”, “best to best” and “composite” conditions, so that evaluation of the sample can cover all the possibilities of pumping operation for the entire year. One of these three proposed testing profiles, the composite profile, reduces the total time of execution for testing of a sample, without comprising of any attributes of the testing method. Further, the developed composite radiation profile covers the large geographical area of the India and also other Asian countries and yet impart all realistic environmental conditions. The developed method of testing takes into consideration of the effects of individual components such as PV array, solar pump controller and motor pump set individually and collectively. The method also brings out superiorities and shortcomings in these components under the actual field conditions. All relevant experiment results are produced to verify the proposed testing methods.

Solar photovoltaics pumps operating head selection for the optimum efficiency

Solar Photovoltaic Water Pumping (SPVWP) systems have established their potential as the most dependable and economically viable systems compared to the diesel based or grid-based electrical pumps. This paper presents an in-depth investigation of the energy efficiency of SPVWP system based on solar radiation, temperature, and operational heads. The study also identifies the shortcomings in the conventional design method based on Best Efficiency Point (BEP) concept that is applicable only in case of fixed frequency and voltage type pumps. However, in the case of SPVWP systems, due to variations in the solar intensity, ambient temperature, and water head, BEP concept does not offer the best efficiency design. The study experimentally proves that the model based on weighted system efficiency and Solar Operational Duty Head (SODH) increases the performance of SPVWP system (∼9% gain) and is consistently provide higher efficiencies in any season or under any climatic conditions.

Perspectives of solar photovoltaic water pumping for irrigation in India

Due to the continuous increase in the use of fossil fuel, India and the world are facing the daunting prospect of a changed climate. A major consumer of fossil fuel-based energy is the diesel and electric water pumps used for irrigation in India. Almost 45 million tones of CO2 is added to the atmosphere by using diesel and electric water pumps annually, which is equivalent to 8%–12% of the total greenhouse gas emissions. To mitigate these challenges, the Indian government has launched a solar pumping program for irrigation and drinking water for installation of 0.1 million Solar Photovoltaic Water Pump (SPVWP) in 2014–2015 with an ambitious target of 1 million till 2020–2021 because of its proven advantages worldwide. Despite all these facts, the growth and development of SPVWP are of substandard. Therefore, this article analyzed in detail the government policies and support system for the growth of SPVWP in India. It describes in brief the technology used and discusses in detail the opportunities for SPVWP development and current status of SPVWP in India and in the world. At the end, a robust analysis of the key barriers of SPVWP is done along with policy recommendations using causal loop diagram (CLD).

English

A solar photovoltaic (PV) water pumping system was investigated to determine performance and economic viability. An in-built data logger was used to collect real time data on key performance parameters. Performance indicators were defined and determined, while economic viability was analyzed using life-cycle cost (LCC) method and these costs were compared with a diesel generator pumping system. Solar irradiance varied from 63 W/m2 to a peak of 857 W/m2, corresponding to a maximum power output of 11.75 kW. PV array efficiency of 12.1%, sub-system efficiency of 91.82% and overall efficiency of 5.14% were obtained, which are well comparable to the efficiencies reported elsewhere for similar systems. The LCC analysis showed a 20 year average unit water cost of 0.25 US $/m3 for solar PV system and 0.6 US $/m3 for diesel genset system. Solar PV system is found to be more cost effective and suitable for use over conventional sources. Key words: Photovoltaics, water pumping, life-cycle cost analysis, efficiency, unit water costs, diesel generator.

'Worst Month’ and ‘Critical Period' Methods for the Sizing of Solar Irrigation Systems – A Comparison

Despite the fact that solar photovoltaic (PV) water pumping systems, in particular, irrigation systems have been in use for more than 40 years, there remains a need for their improvement and development. The sizing of such systems is very important in terms of their energy output and hydraulic sustainability. This paper presents and explains an innovative methodology for the sizing of PV irrigation systems, called the Critical Period Method (CPM). CPM includes information about the design of the elements of the solution, the PV system, the pump station and the water reservoir, based on the critical period of operation of each one. The period within which water pumping and water consumption can be balanced is usually at least one day and may be several days, but it is usually no more than five days. A comparison between the most commonly used sizing method, the Worst Month Method (WMM) and the CPM method will be presented. It will be shown that the new method, CPM, could be beneficial for the sizing of PV irrigation systems.

Standalone Photovoltaic Water Pumping System Using Induction Motor Drive With Reduced Sensors

A simple and efficient solar photovoltaic (PV) water pumping system utilizing an induction motor drive (IMD) is presented in this paper. This solar PV water pumping system comprises two stages of power conversion. The first stage extracts the maximum power from a solar PV array by controlling the duty ratio of a dc–dc boost converter. The dc bus voltage is maintained by the controlling the motor speed. This regulation helps in the reduction of motor losses by reducing motor currents at higher voltage for the same power injection. To control the duty ratio, an incremental conductance based maximum power point tracking (MPPT) control technique is utilized. A scalar-controlled voltage source inverter serves the purpose of operating an IMD. The stator frequency reference of IMD is generated by the proposed control scheme. The proposed system is modeled, and its performance is simulated in detail. The scalar control eliminates the requirement of a speed sensor/encoder. Consequently, the need of motor current sensor is also eliminated. Moreover, the dynamics are improved by an additional speed feedforward term in the control scheme. The proposed control scheme makes the system inherently immune to the variation in the pump constant. The prototype of PV-powered IMD emulating the pump characteristics is developed in the laboratory to examine the performance under different operating conditions.