Development of one-section microchannels cooling system for high-concentration photovoltaic cells

Ibrahim, Mohammed ,; Abdel-Hameeda, Hala ,; Abou-Ziyana,, Hosny

doi:10.21608/erj.2019.131389

Development of one-section microchannels cooling system for high-concentration photovoltaic cells

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Mech. Power Eng. Dept., Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo, Egypt.

² Mech. Power Eng. Dept., Faculty of Engineering, Helwan University, Cairo, Egypt. Mech. Power Eng. Dept., College of Technological Studies, PAAET, Kuwait.

10.21608/erj.2019.131389

Abstract

This paper presents the development of simple, effective and economic microchannel systems for cooling high-concentration multi-junction photovoltaic (HCMJPV) cells. The developed cooling system uses a short cooling fluid path concept with one microchannel section per the fluid path. The work is conducted using a 3D numerical model that is based on the finite volume method. The effects of design parameters on the thermal characteristics of one-section microchannels and output power of the HCMJPV cells are comprehensively investigated. Cooling systems that attained the largest net output power of HCMJPV cells are identified. The developed cooling system achieved superior characteristics compared to the existing state of the art system. The proposed constant-width one-section cooling system achieves comparable standard deviation and lower surface temperature (35.65°C), pressure drop (68.41%) and microchannel thermal resistance (49.57%) along with higher generated power (8.27%), net output power (8.44%) and overall heat transfer coefficient (175.8%) than the existed cooling system in literature. The developed cooling system allows the cells to produce an extra 820.5MWh/m2 of cells, during their lifetime.

Keywords