Numerical Study of a Natural Convection Cooling Loop System for Floating Photovoltaic Panels

Floating photovoltaic (FPV) system offers advantages, such as being free from shading and large open land area, controlling water losses and algae boom, minimising dust pollution, being easy to maintain, and lowering temperature due to water evaporation. In addition, the low operating temperature of solar cells will increase the system's electrical energy output and efficiency. This research will investigate the potential of a natural convection cooling loop to decrease the temperature of FPV panels without external energy. The objective is to develop a numerical model for the entire system, which includes radiation absorption, natural convection, heat conduction and electrical power generation, to understand and optimise the thermal performance. This is achieved by first modelling a simplified natural convection cooling loop, using computational fluid dynamics and then by gradually adding further modelling elements, to take into account the daily variation of heat input, thermal radiation exchanges, heat conduction, electrical generation, and heat losses. Preliminary results show that the natural convection cooling loop system effectively improves the cooling rate of FPVs. Simulations produced so far, provide important and new insights of how natural convection cooling can be introduced to FPV cells and how it can be optimised.