A Comprehensive Investigation of Different Porous Media Effects on the Performance of Photovoltaic Thermal Systems

Abstract

The study aimed to assess the impact of porous media on the efficiency of photovoltaic thermal (PVT) systems through three different configurations: top, middle, and fully filled. The researchers used various porous materials, including metal foam, ceramic foam, and ordinary porous media, to investigate their effects on the system's performance. They found that the type of porous material, its porosity, permeability, and thermal conductivity can all play a significant role in improving the module's efficiency, and their impact can vary depending on the configuration used.Taking into account the porosity at which various porous materials achieved the highest efficiency, it was found that the thermal efficiency improvement ( [[EQUATION]] ) for metal foams and ceramic foams, as well as Al screen and Cu screen in the category of ordinary materials, are almost identical. By considering different configurations in these materials, the middle configuration has the lowest [[EQUATION]] of around 17%. In the top configuration, [[EQUATION]] adds around 7% compared to the middle one, while the full porous configuration has the highest [[EQUATION]] of 32%. All materials show better improvement at the top configuration compared to the middle one, except for wood. In the ordinary category, Graphite compared to the other materials, in the middle configuration shows the lowest [[EQUATION]] . In all cases, the pump power consumption growth is negligible compared to the PV power output. In all materials and configurations, there was a small improvement in the electrical efficiency reaching 1.25% in the full porous configuration. From a holistic perspective, this study showed using porous media can improve the overall equivalent power by up to 9.8% compared to a smooth channel.

Keywords: Photovoltaic thermal collectors, Solar Energy, Porous media, Computational Fluid Dynamics, Performance enhancement