Investigating the Effect of Tube Diameter on the Performance of a Hybrid Photovoltaic-Thermal System Based on Phase Change Materials and Nanofluids

Saeed Alqaed; Jawed Mustafa; Fahad Awjah Almehmadi; Mathkar A Alharthi; Mohsen Sharifpur; Goshtasp Cheraghian

doi:10.3390/ma15217613

Investigating the Effect of Tube Diameter on the Performance of a Hybrid Photovoltaic-Thermal System Based on Phase Change Materials and Nanofluids

Materials (Basel). 2022 Oct 29;15(21):7613. doi: 10.3390/ma15217613.

Authors

Saeed Alqaed¹, Jawed Mustafa¹, Fahad Awjah Almehmadi², Mathkar A Alharthi³, Mohsen Sharifpur^{4

5}, Goshtasp Cheraghian^{6

7}

Affiliations

¹ Mechanical Engineering Department, College of Engineering, Najran University, P.O. Box 1988, Najran 61441, Saudi Arabia.
² Department of Applied Mechanical Engineering, College of Applied Engineering, Muzahimiyah Branch, King Saud University, P.O. Box 800, Riyadh 11421, Saudi Arabia.
³ Department of Chemical Engineering, College of Engineering at Yanbu, Taibah University, Yanbu Al-Bahr 41911, Saudi Arabia.
⁴ Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering, University of Pretoria, Private Bag X20, Hatfield 0028, Pretoria 0002, South Africa.
⁵ Department of Medical Research, China Medical University Hospital, China Medical University, Taichung 404, Taiwan.
⁶ Institut für Chemie and IRIS Adlershof, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Germany.
⁷ Department of Chemistry, King's College London, London, UK.

Abstract

The finite element (FEM) approach is used in this study to model the laminar flow of an eco-friendly nanofluid (NF) within three pipes in a solar system. A solar panel and a supporting phase change material (PCM) that three pipelines flowed through made up the solar system. An organic, eco-friendly PCM was employed. Several fins were used on the pipes, and the NF temperature and panel temperature were measured at different flow rates. To model the NF flow, a two-phase mixture was used. As a direct consequence of the flow rate being raised by a factor of two, the maximum temperature of the panel dropped by 1.85 °C, and the average temperature dropped by 1.82 °C. As the flow rate increased, the temperature of the output flow dropped by up to 2 °C. At flow rates ranging from low to medium to high, the PCM melted completely in a short amount of time; however, at high flow rates, a portion of the PCM remained non-melted surrounding the pipes. An increase in the NF flow rate had a variable effect on the heat transfer (HTR) coefficient.

Keywords: environment; organic PCM; solar energy; two-phase organic nanofluid.

Grants and funding

The Deanship of Scientific Research at Najran University for funding this work under the Research Groups Funding Program, grant code (NU/RG/SERC/11/9).