Experimental investigation of solar photovoltaic panel integrated with phase change material and multiple conductivity-enhancing-containers

Preeti Singh, Vijay Mudgal, Sourav Khanna*, Tapas K. Mallick, K. S. Reddy

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

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Abstract

Among all passive methods for photovoltaics (PV) cooling, phase change material (PCM) can be highly effective due to high latent heat capacity. However, very low thermal-conductivity of PCM restricts its potential. The proposed work focuses on the enhancement of rate of heat transfer from PV to PCM by using conductivity-enhancing-containers. The proposed approach was experimented outdoor and compared with the reference panel for different seasons at Chennai, India. PV temperature, open circuit voltage, short circuit current, Current-Voltage (I–V) and Power-Voltage (P–V) curves, fill-factors, power outputs, efficiency and daily electricity generation are reported. The results show that the proposed heat sink was able to decrease the maximum PV temperature from 64.4 °C to 46.4 °C for January and 77.1 °C to 53.8 °C for June. It increased the open circuit voltage of PV from 24.3 V to 26.4 V for January and 23.6 V to 26.0 V for June. The fill-factor increased from 0.678 to 0.705 for January. Consequently, the electrical efficiency increased from 9.5% to 10.5% during noon. Daily electricity generation increased from 769 Wh/day to 817 Wh/day during January and 948 Wh/day to 1026 Wh/day during June. Thus, daily electricity generation increased by 6.2% for January and 8.3% for June using proposed approach.

Original languageEnglish
Article number118047
Number of pages13
JournalEnergy
Volume205
Early online date6 Jun 2020
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 15 Aug 2020

Keywords

  • Phase change material
  • Photovoltaic panel
  • Temperature regulation
  • RCUK
  • EPSRC
  • EP/K03619X/1

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