Solar PVT Development and Integration Strategy for Saudi Arabia
[Thesis]
Almakrami, Hussain
White, Carl
Morgan State University
2020
90 p.
D.Eng.
Morgan State University
2020
A comparative solar PV analysis was conducted for two different locations, Washington DC and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, to investigate the design of a photovoltaic thermal system that could moderate temperature and increase power efficiency. The analysis consisted of a custom designed active solar photovoltaic thermal system and a passive photovoltaic system. The comparative analysis entailed an experiment consisting of a custom PVT and a comparable regular solar PV, where temperature and power were measured, and an efficiency calculated for each experiment. In addition, finite element modeling was done using COMSOL to show temperature effects in relation to irradiance changes. The results of the experiments exhibited positive power shifts of 18% and 12% for the non-cooled panels to the cooled panels, for the DC and the Riyadh locations, respectively. Also, the efficiency increased by 2.4% and 1.5% for the non- cooled panels to the cooled panels, for the DC and the Riyadh locations, respectively.