Performance of a double pass photovoltaic thermal solar collector suitablefor solar drying systems

The photovoltaic thermal solar collector, sometimes known as the hybrid sol ar collector generates both thermal and electrical energies simultaneously. A double pass photovoltaic thermal solar collector suitable for solar dryi ng applications has been developed and tested. A steady state closed form s olution to determine the outlet and mean photovoltaic panel temperature has been obtained for the differential equations of the upper and lower channe ls of the collector. Hence, the photovoltaic, thermal and combined photovol taic thermal efficiencies can be obtained. An experimental setup has been d eveloped. For given sets of operating and design conditions the theoretical and experimental outlet and mean photovoltaic panel temperatures can be ob tained. Comparisons are made between the experimental and theoretical resul ts and close agreement between these two values are obtained. (C) 1999 Else vier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.