Experimental Air Impingement Crossflow Comparison and Theoretical Application to Photovoltaic Efficiency Improvement

Pablo Martínez-Filgueira, Ekaitz Zulueta, Ander Sánchez-Chica, Gustavo García, Unai Fernandez-Gamiz and Josu Soriano
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Pablo Martínez-Filgueira: CS Centro Stirling S. Coop., Avda. Álava 3, 20550 Aretxabaleta, Spain
Ekaitz Zulueta: Automatic Control and System Engineering Department, University of the Basque Country, 01006 Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain
Ander Sánchez-Chica: Automatic Control and System Engineering Department, University of the Basque Country, 01006 Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain
Gustavo García: CS Centro Stirling S. Coop., Avda. Álava 3, 20550 Aretxabaleta, Spain
Unai Fernandez-Gamiz: Nuclear Engineering and Fluid Mechanics Department, University of the Basque Country, 01006 Vitoria-Gasteiz, Spain
Josu Soriano: CS Centro Stirling S. Coop., Avda. Álava 3, 20550 Aretxabaleta, Spain

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 14, 1-19

Abstract: The photovoltaic cell temperature is a key factor in solar energy harvesting. Solar radiation raises temperature on the cell, lowering its peak efficiency. Air jet impingement is a high heat transfer rate system and has been previously used to cool the back surface of photovoltaic modules and cells. In this work, an experimental comparison of the cooling performance of two different air jet impingement crossflow schemes was performed. Crossflow is defined as the air mass interacting with a certain jet modifying its movement. This leads to a change in its heat exchange capabilities and is related with the inlet-outlet arrangement of the fluid. In this work, zero and minimum crossflow schemes were compared. The main contribution of this work considered the consumption of the flow supplying devices to determine the most suitable system. The best configuration increased the net power output of the cell by 6.60%. These results show that air impingement cooling can play a role in increasing photovoltaic profitability. In terms of uniformity, on small impingement plates with a low number of nozzles, the advantages expected from the zero crossflow configuration did not stand out.

Keywords: impingement; heat transfer; photovoltaic; thermal management; cooling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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