IMPROVEMENT OF SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAIC MODULE EFFICIENCIES THROUGH WATER COOLING AND DEBRIS REMOVAL

Low energy conversion efficiency is one of the major problems that take place in the method of photovoltaic power generation. The factors that cause this problem to occur are mainly due to the extremely high operating surface temperatures of the photovoltaic module and the dust accumulation on the solar module surface. Therefore, the objectives set in this project are to highlight how these factors do affect the module performance and how can they be solved. The first objective of the case study is to study the effects of surface temperature cooling on the photovoltaic modules while the second objective emphasizes on the performance of PV modules with respect to debris accumulation on the module surface. In order to carry out the project, a prototype was first built to implement the method of water cooling on the photovoltaic module. The performance of the module with water cooling is then compared to the conventional module (no modifications). As for the debris accumulation study, the conventional module is covered with opaque sheets of different sizes resembling the dust coverage area on module surfaces and the output power is compared with the module with water cooling (zero dust coverage). Based on the results obtained, it can be analysed that when the water cooling technique is applied on the PV module, the average highest performance improvement comparing to the conventional module, reaches up to a maximum value of 43.24% (5th July 2013). This proves that the addition of water layer helps in improving the amount of power generated for a specific solar irradiation, thus efficiencies increase as well from 11.01% to 17.45%. As for the dust accumulation experiment, the highest average performance improvement achieved is 89.94%; when comparing the module with water cooling to the conventional module set up with 50% dust area coverage. The module with water cooling also has an improved efficiency of 23.92% compared to the efficiency of the conventional module with dust coverage which is only 10.61%, at peak hours. Hence, the project study carried out proves that improvement of the photovoltaic module efficiencies is highly possible with application of the water cooling method. This method does not only reduce the surface temperatures of the module, but also prevent dust settlement on the module surface as well.