Abstract:
Despite the attractiveness of Photovoltaic (PV) cells for electrification and supplying power
in term of environmental criteria and fuel saving, their efficiency is relatively low and is further
decreased by temperature increment, as a consequence of absorption of solar radiation. In order to
prevent efficiency degradation of solar cells due to temperature increment, thermal management
is suggested. Active cooling of solar cells with use of liquid flow is one of the most conventional
techniques used in recent years. By use of nanofluids with improved thermophysical properties, the
efficiency of this cooling approach is improvable. In this article, Single Walled Carbon Nano Tube
(SWCNT)/water nanofluid is used for cooling of a PV cell by considering variations in different factors
such as volume fraction of solid phase, solar radiation, ambient temperature and mass flow rate.
According to the findings, use of the nanofluid can lead to improvement in performance enhancement;
however, this is not significant compared with water. In cases using water and the nanofluid at
0.5% and 1% concentrations, the maximum improvement in the efficiency of the cell compared with
the cell without cooing were 49.2%, 49.3 and 49.4%, respectively. In addition, sensitivity analysis
was performed on the performance enhancement of the cell and it was noticed that solar radiation
has the highest impact on the performance enhancement by using the applied cooling technique,
followed by ambient temperature, mass flow rate of the coolants and concentration of the nanofluid,
respectively. Moreover, exergy analysis is implemented on the system and it is noticed that lower
ambient temperature and solar radiation are preferred in term of exergy efficiency.
