A Calibration of the Solar Load Ratio Method to Determine the Heat Gain in PV-Trombe Walls

Roberto Bruno, Piero Bevilacqua, Daniela Cirone, Stefania Perrella and Antonino Rollo
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Roberto Bruno: Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering Department, University of Calabria, P. Bucci 46/C, Arcavacata di, 87036 Rende, CS, Italy
Piero Bevilacqua: Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering Department, University of Calabria, P. Bucci 46/C, Arcavacata di, 87036 Rende, CS, Italy
Daniela Cirone: Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering Department, University of Calabria, P. Bucci 46/C, Arcavacata di, 87036 Rende, CS, Italy
Stefania Perrella: Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering Department, University of Calabria, P. Bucci 46/C, Arcavacata di, 87036 Rende, CS, Italy
Antonino Rollo: Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering Department, University of Calabria, P. Bucci 46/C, Arcavacata di, 87036 Rende, CS, Italy

Energies, 2022, vol. 15, issue 1, 1-15

Abstract: The Trombe wall is a passive system used in buildings that indirectly transfers thermal energy to the adjacent environment by radiation and convection, and directly by the thermo-circulation that arises in the air cavity delimited between a transparent and an absorbing surface. Nevertheless, the latter is painted black to increase the energy gains, but this produces a negative visual impact and promotes the overheating risk in summer. To mitigate these aspects, a hybrid Trombe wall equipped with PV panels can be employed. The PV installation results in a more pleasing wall appearance and the overheating risk reduces because part of the absorbed solar radiation is transformed into electricity. To determine the actual performance of a such system, transient simulation tools are required to consider properly the wall thermal storage features, variation of the optical properties, air thermo-circulation, and PV power production. Alternatively, regarding the traditional Trombe wall, the literature provides a simplified empirical method based on the dimensionless parameter solar load ratio (SLR) that allows for preliminary evaluations and design. In this paper, the SLR method was calibrated to determine the monthly auxiliary energy to be supplied in buildings equipped with PV-Trombe walls in heating applications. The SLR method was tuned by a multiple linear regression by data provided by TRNSYS simulation that allowed to obtain the energy performances in actual conditions of PV-Trombe walls installed on the same building but located in different localities. The comparison between the TRNSYS results and the calibrated SLR method determined average errors ranging between 0.7% and 1.4%, demonstrating the validity of the proposed methodology.

Keywords: passive systems; PV-Trombe wall; design evaluation; solar load ratio (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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