Enhancing the Overall Performance of High-Concentration Photovoltaic/Thermal Systems Employing Hybrid Cooling Topologies

Ali, Ahmed Mohammed; Abdel-Samie, Mostafa Mohammed; Abdel-Rahman, Mohamed

doi:10.21608/erj.2025.342458.1157

Enhancing the Overall Performance of High-Concentration Photovoltaic/Thermal Systems Employing Hybrid Cooling Topologies

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Laboratory of Thermodynamics, Faculty of Engineering (Elmataria), Helwan University, Cairo, Egypt.

² Laboratory of Thermodynamics, Faculty of Engineering (Elmataria), Helwan University, Cairo, Egypt.Mechanical and Nuclear Engineering Department, Khalifa University, Abu Dhabi, UAE.

10.21608/erj.2025.342458.1157

Abstract

High-concentrated photovoltaic (PV) panels encounter critical challenges, such as the non-uniform distribution of the solar spectrum and diminished efficiency, which significantly impact their overall performance and long-term durability. This study presents a novel hybrid cooling topology, which combines a spider network as a heat sink with jet impingement technology. This cooling topology employs a hexagonal spider network of microchannels, featuring several jets and four outlet manifolds, designed to ensure optimal temperature uniformity across the PV panel. A series of multiphysics simulation activities is conducted to ensure accurate modeling of the optical, thermal, and electrical performance, integrating computational fluid dynamics (CFD) for thermal-electric analysis and Mote Carlo ray-tracing techniques for optical modeling. The reliability of the simulations is measured and verified. The overall performance of the concentrator photovoltaic/thermal (CPV/T) system is evaluated under different solar intensities (400-1200 W/m2), coolant flow rates (0.5-1.3 kg/s), and manifold angles (1-5^°). The findings reveal that the lowest pumping power is achieved by a manifold angle of 5^°. Moreover, the five-degree, four-outlet manifold design achieves superior performance with a total exergy efficiency of 9.28% and electrical energy efficiency of 8.96% at a flow rate of 1.3 kg/s. Compared to the previous design in the literature, the advanced cooling system enhances net electric power by 84.71%, net output power by 135.25%, reduces pumping power by 71.67%, and lowers temperature nonuniformity by 52.89% .

Keywords