Development of a fully coupled concentrator-spectral splitter-thermal-electrical model with evaluation of electrical uniformity for full-spectrum photovoltaic/thermal systems

Chenyu Zhang, Ning Wang, Hongtao Xu, Zhenjun Ma and Zhiguo Qu

Energy, 2024, vol. 313, issue C

Abstract: Concentrated photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) systems encounter challenges of limited spectrum utilization and localized overheating PV panels. Nanofluids with beam filtering provide a dual-function solution by converting part of the spectrum into electricity while absorbing the remainder as heat. This study developed an innovative coupled concentrator-spectral beam splitter (SBS)-thermal-electrical model for a parabolic trough concentrated system integrated with an Ag-water beam splitter. A novel method for quantifying performance uniformity was proposed, and key thermal and electrical metrics were systematically evaluated across various concentration ratios (CRs), with and without the splitter. Model validation showed a 5.52 % relative error in electrical performance, proving the model reliability. In systems without a splitter, the localized overheating and inefficiencies of the PV panels intensified with higher CR, despite thermal performance gains. Compared with the CPV/T system, the quality and efficiency of the thermal energy were 3.3 and 9.52 times greater at a CR of 10 in the system with a splitter, and the PV efficiencies reaching 30.70 %. Additionally, the temperature and PV efficiency uniformity showed improvements with respect to the conventional CPV/T system of 75.47 % and 68.20 %, respectively. This study demonstrated that the SBS-CPV/T system exhibited exceptional performance and stability for practical applications.

Keywords: Full-spectrum; Ag-water beam splitter; Concentrated photovoltaic thermal system; Optical analysis; Fully coupled optical-thermal-electrical model; Quantified uniformity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:313:y:2024:i:c:s0360544224038842

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2024.134106

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