Vol 53, No 3 (2017)

Most of the renewable energy sources are not distributed directly to consumer. It gone through several section to get optimum output voltage and current with the almost zero distortion. Direct Matrix converters are well known of its better power quality and low power distortion to the reactive loads. Conversely, multilevel H bridge inverters are broadly used to attain a sinusoidal output voltage in solar photovoltaic application. Reactive power is subject to high importance for the operation of alternating current (AC) power systems. Moreover there is always a challenge to obtain the balance current control from an unbalanced supply voltage with minimum harmonic distortion for reactive load application from solar power system. The main objective of the proposed system is to maximize the power usage by maintaining the current and power factor nearby unity. There are many different optimization techniques are used so far in matrix converter, a novel method of optimization BAT algorithm is proposed for the power quality to get the best result. This work mainly deals with the compensation of reactive power used in Solar Photovoltaic Power System. Bidirectional energy flow is possible with matrix converter for battery charging. Simulation results are presented to confirm the appropriate operation of the system under different of operating conditions. Also, in the proposed method the percentage of the higher order harmonics can reduced less than 9% of matrix converter for solar photovoltaic application.

Solar flat plate collector (SFPC) is regarded as one of the best renewable energy devices to acquire hot water for domestic usage. Though its theoretical efficiency is projected at higher scale, its conversion efficiency is observed to be low due to various collector losses. Hence, to achieve improved performance of collector different techniques for heat transfer augmentation in circular pipes can be adopted. Among passive and active techniques available, passive is preferred over active due to economics and saving in exergy. Hence, in the present study absorber tube configuration is modified with internal grooves in the collector setup to enhance the rate of heat transfer. Also, fluids dispersed with metal oxide particles provide an increase in thermal conductivity such that ZnO-based aqueous EG mixture nanofluid is used as working medium to analyze the performance of collector setup. Also, the change in heat transfer rate and temperature profile of grooved tubes under forced laminar conditions for different working fluids are compared and reported.

A practical fault detection approach for PV systems intended for online implementation is developed. The fault detection model here is built using artificial neural network. initially the photovoltaic system is simulated using MATLAB software and output power is collected for various combinations of irradiance and temperature. Data is first collected for normal operating condition and then four types of faults are simulated and data are collected for faulty conditions. Four faults are considered here and they are: Line to Line faults with a small voltage difference, Line to line faults with a large voltage difference, degradation fault and open-circuit fault. This data is then used to train the neural network and to develop the fault detection model. The fault detection model takes irradiance, temperature and power as the input and accurately gives the type of fault in the PV system as the output. This system is a generalized one as any PV module datasheet can be used to simulate the Photovoltaic system and also this fault detection system can be implemented online with the use of data acquisition system.

The efficiency of photovoltaic (PV) panel drops with increase in cell temperature. The temperature of the PV panel can be controlled with various cooling techniques. In the proposed work the PV panel is cooled by circulating water and the recovered heat energy is used to run a humidification and dehumidification desalination to produce distilled water from sea water (or) brackish water. This work deals with a detailed analysis of performance of combined power and desalination (Photovoltaic/Thermal–Humidification and Dehumidification) system. A mathematical model of PV/thermal–humidification dehumidification plant was developed and simulations were carried out in MATLAB environment. The performance of photovoltaic/ thermal desalination (Photovoltaic/Thermal–Humidification and Dehumidification) system was investigated under various solar radiation levels (800–1000 W/m²). For each solar radiation level the effect of mass flow rate of coolant water (30–110 kg/h) on water outlet temperature, PV efficiency, PVT thermal efficiency, distilled water production, and plant efficiency was studied. Results show that under each solar radiation level increasing coolant flow rate increases efficiency of PV panel and reduces the plant efficiency. The highest PV efficiency (16.598%) was reached under 800 W/m² at mass flow rate of 110 kg/h and the highest plant efficiency (43.15%) was reached under 800 W/m² at a mass flow rate of 30 kg/h. The maximum amount of distilled water production rate (0.82 L/h) was reached under 1000 W/m² at water mass flow rate of 30 kg/h.

In Central Receiver Systems (CRSs), thousands of heliostats track the sunrays and reflect beam radiation on to a receiver surface. The size of the reflected image and the extent of reflection from the heliostats are one of the important criteria that need to be taken into account while designing a receiver, since spillage losses may vary from 2 to 16% of the total losses. The present study aims to determine the size of an external cylindrical receiver, such that the rays reflected from all the heliostats in the field are intercepted. A dimensionless correlation with respect to tower height and receiver size (diameter and height) as a function of heliostat size and its position is discussed in the paper. This correlation could be used as a first-order approximation to estimate the receiver dimensions. When applied to the Ivanpah Solar Electricity Generating Station (ISEGS) plant, the correlation yields satisfactory estimation of receiver dimensions.

The commercial refrigeration and air conditioning consumes more electric power for its operation. The solar vapor absorption refrigeration helps to minimize the electric power usage and it is renewable. Large size of solar collector area is required for producing the standalone power as well as cooling cycle. The integration of power and cooling cycle minimizes the number of components such as heat exchanger, separator and collector area. The main objective of the work is to integrate power and cooling for two outputs with single cycle using NaSCN–NH₃ as working fluid. The advantages of NaSCN–NH₃ are having high pressure and pure ammonia vapor at the exit of the generator. The integrated cycle is made by providing the turbine at the exit of the generator along with superheater. It has three pressures of generator, condensing and sink pressure, which is depending on separator and ambient temperature. At the separator temperature of 150°C with weak solution concentration of 0.30, it produces the cogeneration output of 284.80 kW with cycle and plant thermal efficiency of 0.49 and 0.20 respectively.

The Multi-layered Thermal Energy Storage (TES) tank consists of three regions–top and bottom part is packed with suitable Phase Change Materials (PCM) and low-cost pebbles are placed in the middle region, whereas entire tank portion is filled by solid fillers in Single-layered tank system. For a storage tank operating between 563 and 663 K with bed dimensions of 12 and 14.38 m using Solar salt as Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF), it is observed that the duration of discharge for multi-layered tank is 5.32 h whereas it is 4.19 h for single-layered tank with a Reynolds number of 10. The effect of intermediate melting temperature range of PCMs are also analyzed by taking PCMs with sharp as well as intermediate melting ranges. Further, comparison of single and multi-layered systems is carried out by analyzing the temperature profiles and width of both PCM layers. The width of top and bottom PCM layers of tank is varied from 0 to 30% to analyze its effect on the discharging duration. It is observed that multi-layered system provides extra discharge of 1 h with introduction of PCM at top and bottom with a width of 10%. Discharge duration increases with increase in PCM width whereas the percentage increase in duration of discharge with increase in PCM width is comparatively less. It is also seen that PCMs with sharp melting point performs better compared to one having intermediate range of melting temperatures. Multi-layered configuration concept offers best possibilities as integration to CSP plants with desired efficiency.