Thermal analysis of water-cooled photovoltaic cell by applying computational fluid dynamics
- PDF / 823,205 Bytes
- 7 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 48 Downloads / 156 Views
Thermal analysis of water‑cooled photovoltaic cell by applying computational fluid dynamics Guanghua Wu1,3 · Qiang Liu1,2,3 · Jun Wang1 · Bohua Sun2 Received: 19 March 2020 / Accepted: 19 September 2020 © Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest, Hungary 2020
Abstract Photovoltaic (PV) modules are used for producing electricity in different scales. The efficiency of these modules is highly dependent on their temperature. Owing to the higher efficiency of PV cells at lower temperatures, different thermal management approaches have been suggested in recent years. Water cooling is one of the most efficient methods in PV cells thermal management. In the present article, numerical simulation, on the basis of computational fluid dynamic, is performed to investigate the influence of solar irradiance, ambient temperature and speed of wind on the efficiency and temperature of a monocrystalline cell. The outcomes of simulation revealed that utilizing the applied cooling approach for PV cells in hot ambient temperature and high solar irradiance is more useful. In addition, it is concluded that by employing water for cooling the cell, under the considered conditions, the temperature of the cell can be kept in an appropriate range which prevents its efficiency degradation at high solar irradiance and ambient temperatures. Furthermore, according to the obtained temperature of the cell in different considered cases it is observed that the effect of wind speed is in lower degree of importance compared with solar irradiance and ambient temperature in cases of employing water cooling, while wind speed impact become noticeable when the thermal management approach is not employed. The maximum enhancement in the cell efficiency is approximately 52% in comparison with the reference case without applying cooling. Keywords PV cell · Water cooling · Solar irradiance · Computational fluid dynamics List of symbols Cp Specific heat transfer coefficient of coolant hh Convective heat transfer coefficient qel Electrical output qh Convective heat transfer qr Radiative heat transfer qs Solar irradiance Ta Ambient temperature Ts Cell temperature uw Wind speed 𝛽 Efficiency of cell 𝜌 Density of coolant * Qiang Liu [email protected] 1
School of Automotive Engineering, Jilin Engineering Normal University, Changchun 130052, Jilin, China
2
State Key Laboratory of Automotive Simulation and Control, Jilin University, Changchun 130012, Jilin, China
3
Research Center for Automotive Safety Technology, Jilin Engineering Normal University, Changchun 130052, Jilin, China
𝜀0 Absorption coefficient 𝜀1 Cell emissivity 𝜎sb Stefan–Boltzmann constant Abbreviations CFD Computational fluid dynamic PCM Phase change material PV Photovoltaic
Introduction Policy makers in the field of energy systems have focused on the development of renewable energy systems due to the problems related to increasing trend of fossil fuel consumption such as greenhouse gas emission and possibility of their exhaustion [1]. Solar, geothermal, hydropower and wind energy a
Data Loading...
