Infinite Photovoltaic Solar Arrays: Considering Flux of Momentum and Heat Transfer

Authors

Andrew D. S. Glick, Portland State UniversityFollow
Naseem Ali, Portland State UniversityFollow
Juliaan Bossuyt, Portland State University
Gerald W. Recktenwald, Portland State UniversityFollow
Marc Calaf, University of UtahFollow
Raúl Bayoán Cal, Portland State UniversityFollow

Sponsor

This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) under the Solar Energy Technologies Office Award Number DE-EE0008168.

Published In

Renewable Energy

Document Type

Citation

Publication Date

8-1-2020

Abstract

Large scale solar farms supply an increasing amount of the worlds electricity supply. However, high operation temperatures can strongly reduce efficiency and panel lifetime, negatively affecting the levelized cost of energy. In this work, the convective heat transfer coefficient for a utility-scale solar farm is studied with combined thermal and particle-image-velocimetry measurements in a scaled wind tunnel experiment. The measurements confirm the applicability of the scaled experimental setup to study large solar arrays. Further, the velocity measurements indicate the complex flow structure within the solar array, governed by wakes directed upwards due to the orientation of the solar panels.

Description

© 2020 Elsevier B.V.

Locate the Document

http://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2020.03.183

DOI

10.1016/j.renene.2020.03.183

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/33515

Citation Details

Glick, A., Ali, N., Bossuyt, J., Recktenwald, G., Calaf, M., & Cal, R. B. (2020). Infinite photovoltaic solar arrays: Considering flux of momentum and heat transfer. Renewable Energy.