IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v236y2019icp906-915.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Transmissive microfluidic active cooling for concentrator photovoltaics

Author

Listed:
  • Islam, Kazi
  • Riggs, Brian
  • Ji, Yaping
  • Robertson, John
  • Spitler, Christopher
  • Romanin, Vince
  • Codd, Daniel
  • Escarra, Matthew D.

Abstract

We present the design, fabrication, characterization, and field testing of transmissive active cooling for use in a point-focus spectrum-splitting hybrid concentrator photovoltaics/thermal (CPV/T) system. Seven parallel-path 100 μm thick microchannels are made using polydimethylsiloxane and attached to a CPV module containing a 6 × 6 array of 5.5 mm transmissive CPV cells on a sapphire substrate. Water is flowed through the microchannels to actively cool the CPV cells. The total transmittance of the CPV module reduces by 5.2% with the addition of the active cooling microchannels, relative to the module transmission with no microchannels. The peak cell temperature is measured as 69 °C with a thermal resistance of 9.35 K/W at 157 suns, well below the 110 °C maximum allowed temperature. A maximum flowrate of 16.7 g/s is achieved from a 13 psi pressure drop across the microchannels and manifold assembly. The flow characteristics within each microfluidic channel show maximum fluid velocity of 4.3 m/s (Re = 953) with a calculated convection coefficient of 1.7 × 104 W/m2 K (Nu = 5.36). The CPV/T module and cooling system performance was validated during week-long outdoor tests under varying solar conditions up to 250 suns using a 2.7 m2 parabolic dish collector mounted to a two-axis tracking system.

Suggested Citation

  • Islam, Kazi & Riggs, Brian & Ji, Yaping & Robertson, John & Spitler, Christopher & Romanin, Vince & Codd, Daniel & Escarra, Matthew D., 2019. "Transmissive microfluidic active cooling for concentrator photovoltaics," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 236(C), pages 906-915.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:236:y:2019:i:c:p:906-915
    DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2018.12.027
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261918318452
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.apenergy.2018.12.027?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gilmore, Nicholas & Timchenko, Victoria & Menictas, Chris, 2018. "Microchannel cooling of concentrator photovoltaics: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 1041-1059.
    2. Rezania, A. & Rosendahl, L.A., 2017. "Feasibility and parametric evaluation of hybrid concentrated photovoltaic-thermoelectric system," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 380-389.
    3. Otanicar, Todd P. & Theisen, Stephen & Norman, Tyler & Tyagi, Himanshu & Taylor, Robert A., 2015. "Envisioning advanced solar electricity generation: Parametric studies of CPV/T systems with spectral filtering and high temperature PV," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 224-233.
    4. Palavras, I. & Bakos, G.C., 2006. "Development of a low-cost dish solar concentrator and its application in zeolite desorption," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 31(15), pages 2422-2431.
    5. Looser, R. & Vivar, M. & Everett, V., 2014. "Spectral characterisation and long-term performance analysis of various commercial Heat Transfer Fluids (HTF) as Direct-Absorption Filters for CPV-T beam-splitting applications," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 1496-1511.
    6. Radwan, Ali & Ahmed, Mahmoud, 2017. "The influence of microchannel heat sink configurations on the performance of low concentrator photovoltaic systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 594-611.
    7. Chow, T.T., 2010. "A review on photovoltaic/thermal hybrid solar technology," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 365-379, February.
    8. Wang, Y.N. & Lin, T.T. & Leong, J.C. & Hsu, Y.T. & Yeh, C.P. & Lee, P.H. & Tsai, C.H., 2013. "Numerical investigation of high-concentration photovoltaic module heat dissipation," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 20-26.
    9. Di Capua H, Mario & Escobar, Rodrigo & Diaz, A.J. & Guzmán, Amador M., 2018. "Enhancement of the cooling capability of a high concentration photovoltaic system using microchannels with forward triangular ribs on sidewalls," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 226(C), pages 160-180.
    10. Tian, Y. & Zhao, C.Y., 2013. "A review of solar collectors and thermal energy storage in solar thermal applications," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 538-553.
    11. Abdelhamid, Mahmoud & Widyolar, Bennett K. & Jiang, Lun & Winston, Roland & Yablonovitch, Eli & Scranton, Gregg & Cygan, David & Abbasi, Hamid & Kozlov, Aleksandr, 2016. "Novel double-stage high-concentrated solar hybrid photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) collector with nonimaging optics and GaAs solar cells reflector," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 182(C), pages 68-79.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Robertson, John & Riggs, Brian & Islam, Kazi & Ji, Yaping Vera & Spitler, Christopher M. & Gupta, Naman & Krut, Dimitri & Ermer, Jim & Miller, Fletcher & Codd, Daniel & Escarra, Matthew, 2019. "Field testing of a spectrum-splitting transmissive concentrator photovoltaic module," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 806-814.
    2. Abo-Zahhad, Essam M. & Ookawara, Shinichi & Radwan, Ali & El-Shazly, A.H. & Elkady, M.F., 2019. "Numerical analyses of hybrid jet impingement/microchannel cooling device for thermal management of high concentrator triple-junction solar cell," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 253(C), pages 1-1.
    3. Nižetić, Sandro & Jurčević, Mišo & Čoko, Duje & Arıcı, Müslüm, 2021. "A novel and effective passive cooling strategy for photovoltaic panel," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    4. Ji, Yaping & Artzt, Luke E. & Adams, Will & Spitler, Christopher & Islam, Kazi & Codd, Daniel & Escarra, Matthew D., 2021. "A transmissive concentrator photovoltaic module with cells directly cooled by silicone oil for solar cogeneration systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 288(C).
    5. Zhu, Yizhou & Ma, Benchi & He, Baichuan & Ma, Xinyu & Jing, Dengwei, 2023. "Liquid spherical lens as an effective auxiliary optical unit for CPV/T system with remarkable hydrogen production efficiency," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 334(C).
    6. Qu, Wanjun & Hong, Hui & Jin, Hongguang, 2019. "A spectral splitting solar concentrator for cascading solar energy utilization by integrating photovoltaics and solar thermal fuel," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 248(C), pages 162-173.
    7. Radwan, Ali & Ookawara, Shinichi & Ahmed, Mahmoud, 2019. "Thermal management of concentrator photovoltaic systems using two-phase flow boiling in double-layer microchannel heat sinks," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 241(C), pages 404-419.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lamnatou, Chr. & Vaillon, R. & Parola, S. & Chemisana, D., 2021. "Photovoltaic/thermal systems based on concentrating and non-concentrating technologies: Working fluids at low, medium and high temperatures," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).
    2. Elsheikh, A.H. & Sharshir, S.W. & Mostafa, Mohamed E. & Essa, F.A. & Ahmed Ali, Mohamed Kamal, 2018. "Applications of nanofluids in solar energy: A review of recent advances," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 82(P3), pages 3483-3502.
    3. Wang, Gang & Yao, Yubo & Lin, Jianqing & Chen, Zeshao & Hu, Peng, 2020. "Design and thermodynamic analysis of a novel solar CPV and thermal combined system utilizing spectral beam splitter," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 1091-1102.
    4. Abou-Ziyan, Hosny & Ibrahim, Mohammed & Abdel-Hameed, Hala, 2020. "Performance modeling and analysis of high-concentration multi-junction photovoltaics using advanced hybrid cooling systems," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 269(C).
    5. Widyolar, Bennett & Jiang, Lun & Winston, Roland, 2018. "Spectral beam splitting in hybrid PV/T parabolic trough systems for power generation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 236-250.
    6. Adam, Saadelnour Abdueljabbar & Ju, Xing & Zhang, Zheyang & Abd El-Samie, Mostafa M. & Xu, Chao, 2019. "Theoretical investigation of different CPVT configurations based on liquid absorption spectral beam filter," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    7. Abo-Zahhad, Essam M. & Ookawara, Shinichi & Radwan, Ali & El-Shazly, A.H. & Elkady, M.F., 2019. "Numerical analyses of hybrid jet impingement/microchannel cooling device for thermal management of high concentrator triple-junction solar cell," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 253(C), pages 1-1.
    8. Riggs, Brian C. & Biedenharn, Richard & Dougher, Christopher & Ji, Yaping Vera & Xu, Qi & Romanin, Vince & Codd, Daniel S. & Zahler, James M. & Escarra, Matthew D., 2017. "Techno-economic analysis of hybrid PV/T systems for process heat using electricity to subsidize the cost of heat," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 208(C), pages 1370-1378.
    9. Brekke, Nick & Dale, John & DeJarnette, Drew & Hari, Parameswar & Orosz, Matthew & Roberts, Kenneth & Tunkara, Ebrima & Otanicar, Todd, 2018. "Detailed performance model of a hybrid photovoltaic/thermal system utilizing selective spectral nanofluid absorption," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 683-693.
    10. Siddiqui, M.U. & Siddiqui, Osman K. & Al-Sarkhi, A. & Arif, A.F.M. & Zubair, Syed M., 2019. "A novel heat exchanger design procedure for photovoltaic panel cooling application: An analytical and experimental evaluation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 239(C), pages 41-56.
    11. Ju, Xing & Xu, Chao & Han, Xue & Du, Xiaoze & Wei, Gaosheng & Yang, Yongping, 2017. "A review of the concentrated photovoltaic/thermal (CPVT) hybrid solar systems based on the spectral beam splitting technology," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 534-563.
    12. Mojiri, Ahmad & Stanley, Cameron & Rodriguez-Sanchez, David & Everett, Vernie & Blakers, Andrew & Rosengarten, Gary, 2016. "A spectral-splitting PV–thermal volumetric solar receiver," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 63-71.
    13. Yin, Ershuai & Li, Qiang & Xuan, Yimin, 2018. "Optimal design method for concentrating photovoltaic-thermoelectric hybrid system," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 226(C), pages 320-329.
    14. Gaur, Ankita & Tiwari, G.N., 2014. "Performance of a-Si thin film PV modules with and without water flow: An experimental validation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 184-191.
    15. Zhang, Xingxing & Shen, Jingchun & Lu, Yan & He, Wei & Xu, Peng & Zhao, Xudong & Qiu, Zhongzhu & Zhu, Zishang & Zhou, Jinzhi & Dong, Xiaoqiang, 2015. "Active Solar Thermal Facades (ASTFs): From concept, application to research questions," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 32-63.
    16. Karolina Papis-Frączek & Krzysztof Sornek, 2022. "A Review on Heat Extraction Devices for CPVT Systems with Active Liquid Cooling," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-49, August.
    17. Ren, Xiao & Li, Jing & Hu, Mingke & Pei, Gang & Jiao, Dongsheng & Zhao, Xudong & Ji, Jie, 2019. "Feasibility of an innovative amorphous silicon photovoltaic/thermal system for medium temperature applications," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 252(C), pages 1-1.
    18. Contento, Gaetano & Lorenzi, Bruno & Rizzo, Antonella & Narducci, Dario, 2017. "Efficiency enhancement of a-Si and CZTS solar cells using different thermoelectric hybridization strategies," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 230-238.
    19. Sakellariou, Evangelos I. & Axaopoulos, Petros J., 2020. "Energy performance indexes for solar assisted ground source heat pump systems with photovoltaic-thermal collectors," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 272(C).
    20. Abdelhamid, Mahmoud & Widyolar, Bennett K. & Jiang, Lun & Winston, Roland & Yablonovitch, Eli & Scranton, Gregg & Cygan, David & Abbasi, Hamid & Kozlov, Aleksandr, 2016. "Novel double-stage high-concentrated solar hybrid photovoltaic/thermal (PV/T) collector with nonimaging optics and GaAs solar cells reflector," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 182(C), pages 68-79.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:236:y:2019:i:c:p:906-915. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.