Article
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Energy Analysis and Exergy Optimization of Photovoltaic-Thermal Collector
Version 1
: Received: 8 September 2020 / Approved: 10 September 2020 / Online: 10 September 2020 (04:42:24 CEST)
A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.
Kallio, S.; Siroux, M. Energy Analysis and Exergy Optimization of Photovoltaic-Thermal Collector. Energies 2020, 13, 5106. Kallio, S.; Siroux, M. Energy Analysis and Exergy Optimization of Photovoltaic-Thermal Collector. Energies 2020, 13, 5106.
Abstract
A photovoltaic-thermal (PVT) collector is a solar-based micro-cogeneration system which generates simultaneously heat and power for buildings. The novelty of this paper is to conduct energy and exergy analysis on PVT collector performance under two different European climate conditions. The performance of the PVT collector is compared to a PV panel. Finally, the PVT design is optimized in terms of thermal and electrical exergy efficiencies. The optimized PVT designs are compared to the PV panel performance as well. The main focus is to find out if the PVT is still competitive with the PV panel electrical output, after maximizing its thermal exergy efficiency. The PVT collector is modelled into Matlab/Simulink to evaluate its performance under varying weather conditions. The PV panel is modelled with the CARNOT toolbox library. The optimization is conducted using Matlab gamultiobj-function based on Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm-II (NSGA-II). The results indicated 7.7% higher annual energy production in Strasbourg. However, the exergy analysis revealed a better quality of thermal energy in Tampere with 72.9% higher thermal exergy production. The electrical output of the PVT is higher than from the PV during the summer months. The thermal exergy- driven PVT design is still competitive compared to the PV panel electrical output.
Keywords
solar energy; micro-cogeneration; exergy; multi-objective optimization; PVT collector; PV panel
Subject
Engineering, Energy and Fuel Technology
Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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