Numerical simulation of a concentrating photovoltaic-thermal solar system combined with thermoelectric modules by coupling Finite Volume and Monte Carlo Ray-Tracing methods

Shadmehri, Mehran; Narei, Hamid; Ghasempour, Roghayeh; Behshad Shafii, Mohammad

Abstract

During the last decades, the adoption of more strict safety and environmental regulations, as well as a rise in energy costs, sparked an increasing interest in the design of renewable energies systems, particularly solar systems, to supply both electrical power and heat. Because of their capability to simultaneously supply both electricity and heat, concentrating photovoltaic-thermal and thermoelectric hybrid systems have recently attracted scholarly attention. In this study, a detailed three-dimensional computational model of a novel concentrating photovoltaic-thermal solar system combined with thermoelectric modules in an integrated design with a triangular absorber and corresponding numerical simulations are presented. For this purpose, a three-dimensional integrated model combined the Finite Volume method with the Monte Carlo Ray-Tracing method is employed. After validating simulation results and providing some discussions on the effects of temperature and cooling on the photovoltaic modules performance, the impacts of varying two design parameters of the system, the aperture width of the reflector and the apex angle of the absorber, on the solar energy flux distribution and output power of photovoltaic modules are discussed. Finally, considering the conditions of the case study, a range of aperture widths for the reflector and apex angles for the triangular absorber are proposed.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: 2018
• Deposit Date: Feb 8, 2025
• Journal: Energy Conversion and Management
• Print ISSN: 0196-8904
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2018.07.034