Enhancing Building Energy Conservation through the Integration of Photovoltaic-Thermal Hybrid Solar Collector

Enhancing Building Energy Conservation through the Integration of Photovoltaic-Thermal Hybrid Solar Collector

This study investigated a photovoltaic-thermal hybrid system constructed on building roofs. The efficiency of an integrated design involving buildingintegrated photovoltaic (BIPV) panels with monocrystalline silicon panels and vacuum tube collectors with compound parabolic concentrator (CPC) mirrors was also examined. Different patterns of vacuum tube placement were compared, which revealed that horizontal placement resulted in higher thermal collection performance than vertical placement. The results indicated that the daily solar thermal collection efficiency of the proposed integrated system of monocrystalline silicon BIPV panels and CPC vacuum tube collectors was 88% of that for a traditional solar water heater. Total primary energy conversion efficiency was adopted as a performance index. Practical tests showed that the power generation efficiency of this system reached 0.11, and total primary energy conversion efficiency of up to 0.72 was achieved, a significant increase compared with systems that employ only solar thermal collectors and single systems for solar power generation and thermal collection.