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Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

www.elsevier.com/locate/solener

Simulation and economic analysis of a CPV/thermal system

coupled with an organic Rankine cycle for increased power generation
G. Kosmadakis ⇑, D. Manolakos, G. Papadakis
Department of Natural Resources and Agricultural Engineering, Agricultural University of Athens, 75 Iera Odos Street, 11855 Athens, Greece

Received 12 January 2010; received in revised form 22 November 2010; accepted 26 November 2010
Available online 30 December 2010

Communicated by: Associate Editor Elias Stefanakos

Abstract

In concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) systems the incident solar radiation is multiplied by a factor equal to the concentration ratio,
with the use of lenses or reflectors. This is implemented, in order to increase the electric power production, since this value has a linear
dependence from the incident radiation. Therefore, the specific energy production of the cells (kWh/m2) radically increases, but due to
this high intensity CPVs consequently operate at elevated temperatures, because heat dissipation to the environment is not so intense and
heat produced cannot naturally convected. This temperature increase not only leads to a reduction of their electric efficiency, but also it
must be dissipated, since issues regarding their degradation and reduction of their lifetime might arise. There are many reported ways of
removing this heat, either by adding a cooling unit on the back side of the CPV module, or by recovering with possible uses in buildings,
industry, additional power production or even desalination of seawater.
The current work is actually a feasibility study, concerning a concentrating photovoltaic/thermal (CPV/T) system, where the heat
produced is recovered by an organic Rankine cycle (ORC) for additional power production. A pump drives the organic fluid of the cycle,
which is evaporated in the tubes of the CPV/T and driven to an expander for mechanical power production. For the condensation of the
organic fluid several possible alternatives can be applied. That way, the PV cells can be cooled effectively and increase their electrical
efficiency, while the recovered heat is designated to produce additional electric energy through the organic Rankine process, when the
expander of the Rankine engine is coupled to a generator.
The scope of the present work is to investigate an alternative application of concentrating PV modules through exploiting the gen-
erated heat by the ORC process and combining both technologies into an integrated system. The design of the system is presented in
details, along with an optimization of some main parameters. The performance of the system will also be examined and compared with
an equivalent conventional CPV system, referring to their design points. Finally, the annual and daily performance will be studied, which
is a more realistic indicator, concerning the increased efficiency this integrated system is expected to have, followed by a cost analysis, in
order to examine its economic feasibility as well.
Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Concentration; PV; Organic Rankine cycle; Solar energy; Heat recovery

1. Introduction in order to experimentally estimate their performance and

CPV/T systems currently constitute a major research
subject. Lately, demonstration units have been constructed,
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +30 210 5294036; fax: +30 210 5294023.
E-mail address: gkosmad@central.ntua.gr (G. Kosmadakis).
some of their operational characteristics (Kribus et al.,
2006; Mittelman et al., 2007; Rosell et al., 2005; Solanki
et al., 2008). Nevertheless, very few commercial units have
been realized. The variety of the concentration ratios is evi-
dent, since it strongly depends on the design, the orientation
of the module, the possibility for incorporation of a sun-
tracking system, which increases the complexity and control

0038-092X/$ - see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.solener.2010.11.019
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324 309

Nomenclature

A PV module area (m2) Tcr critical temperature (°C)

Bt present value of the benefit (€) Tc cell’s temperature (°C)
Ct present value of the cost (€) Tgl cover glass temperature (°C)
CFt cash flow in the year t (€) Tins insulation temperature (°C)
cp specific heat capacity under constant pressure Tref cell’s reference temperature (°C)
(J/kg/K) Tsky sky temperature (°C)
C concentration ratio (–) t time (s)
G direct solar radiation (W/m2) T temperature (°C)
h heat transfer coefficient (W/m2/K) uwind wind velocity (m/s)
hin refrigerant’s heat exchanger inlet enthalpy (J/kg) WT mechanical power produced by the expander of
hout refrigerant’s heat exchanger outlet enthalpy the ORC (W)
(J/kg)
hp,in refrigerant’s pump inlet enthalpy (J/kg) Greek symbols
hp,out refrigerant’s pump outlet enthalpy (J/kg) agl effective absorptivity of the cover PV glass (–)
hT,in refrigerant’s expander inlet enthalpy (J/kg) bref temperature coefficient (1/K)
hT,out refrigerant’s expander outlet enthalpy (J/kg) c solar radiation coefficient (–)
k thermal conductivity (W/m/K) d components’ thickness (m)
m mass of each component (kg) e emission coefficient (–)
m_ ORC R-245fa mass flow rate (kg/s) r Stefan–Boltzman constant (=5.67  108
2 4
nex expander’s efficiency (–) W/m /K )
nG generator’s efficiency (–)
ninv inverter’s efficiency (–) Abbreviations
nopt optical efficiency (–) CPV concentrating photovoltaic
nPV module’s efficiency (–) CPV/T concentrating photovoltaic/thermal
np ORC pump’s efficiency (–) ORC organic Rankine cycle
nTref module’s efficiency at reference conditions (–) NPV net present value
n a future year PBP pay-back-period
Pcool power consumption of the air pump (W) PV photovoltaic
Pcr critical pressure (bar) RO reverse osmosis
PORC electric power produced by the ORC (W) TMY typical meteorological year
Pp,ORC ORC pump power consumption (W)
PPV electric power produced by the CPV (W) Subscripts
Qconv heat convected to the atmosphere (W) a ambient
Qinc concentrated incident radiation (W) abs absorber
QORC heat recovered by ORC (W) e,ORC electric power from ORC
QPV net incident concentrated solar radiation on the e,PV electric power from PV
PV module (W) fl fluid
Qrad heat radiated to the atmosphere (W) gl glass
QTh heat absorbed by the PV cells (W) ins insulator
r interest rate (%) PV photovoltaic

of the system (Chow, 2010), and the area availability,
starting from values of 2 (Solanki et al., 2008) and reaching
even 500 or more (Kribus et al., 2006). Nevertheless, con-
centration ratios for small-scale systems vary in the range
from 10 to 40 (Coventry, 2005; Rosell et al., 2005).
A crucial aspect for their commercialization is new solar
cells to be designed, constructed and long-term tested at
elevated temperatures (Meneses-Rodrıguez et al., 2005).
There is a demand for solar cells that their efficiency does
not decrease substantially, when increasing their opera-
tional temperature (Kalogirou and Tripanagnostopoulos,
2007). In other words, the temperature coefficient in the
expression of the electric efficiency of a solar cell (Skoplaki
and Palyvos, 2009) should be as low as possible. To this
direction many researchers deploy their experimental and
theoretical studies, concerning new materials that can be
used and also reducing the cost of manufacturing the next
generation’s cells (Andreev et al., 2004; Green, 2001, 2003;
Nishioka et al., 2006; Yamaguchi et al., 2005, 2006). Most
of these studies focus on CPVs, since their operation is
much more demanding than the conventional flat plate col-
lectors’ one.
An important design parameter that can influence the
cells’ performance is the efficiency of the heat dissipation
310 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324
equipment and the accurate calculation of the heat transfer
coefficient, in order for the PV cells to be cooled ade-
quately. This issue has been treated by many researchers,
who have conducted simulation and experimental studies
concerning this feature (Ji et al., 2006; Tripanagnostopou-
los et al., 2002, 2005; Tripanagnostopoulos, 2007).
As far as the organic Rankine cycle is concerned, its per-
formance depends mainly on the evaporation/condensa-
tion temperatures of the organic fluid and their selection
is a vital aspect, influencing drastically the overall system’s
efficiency (Kosmadakis et al., 2009a). There are also many
reported works in the literature, dealing with the proper
selection of an organic fluid to be used in an ORC for
applications of low-temperature (60–80 °C) heat recovery
to high (120–150 °C) (Borsukiewicz-Gozdur and Nowak,
2007; Hung et al., 1997; Maizza and Maizza, 2001; Saleh
et al., 2007; Tchanche et al., 2009, 2010; Wang and Zhao,
2009). Therefore, this aspect will not be elaborated in the
present study and the results and conclusions extracted
from the relevant works of the current authors (Kosmada-
kis et al., 2009a; Tchanche et al.,2009, 2010) will be applied
here too.
The design and simulation of an organic Rankine cycle is
of importance as well. The various components should be
selected properly, in order for the integrated system to oper-
ate efficiently not only in the design point, but also in partial
loads. Most of ORC components are available in the
market, except from the expander, which is the most ambig-
uous component. It should be able to handle organic fluids
and moreover it should meet the efficiency expectations
addressed. Its lifetime and cost is another parameter consid-
ered, together with its efficiency at partial loads. Recently,
the works of some researchers revealed that for small-scale
systems, as the one investigated in the present study, the
most suitable expander is a scroll compressor in reverse
operation (Badr et al., 1984; Lemort et al., 2009; Manolakos
et al., 2007, 2009a,b; Quoilin et al., 2010), and this is the one
considered in this study. The simulation studies concern the
identification of the thermodynamic cycle and the calcula-
tion of the organic fluid properties at state changing
locations of the Rankine engine. By introducing also the effi-
ciency of every component, the mechanical power produc-
tion of the expander and the pump power consumption
(Kosmadakis et al., 2009b, 2010a,b; Wei et al., 2007) can
be calculated. The final goal is to estimate the efficiency,
varying in the range of 6–12%, for the ORC and depends
on the operational temperatures and the total number of
thermodynamic stages (Kosmadakis et al., 2009b).
The concept of the present study can be considered a
step forward in the theoretical research activities described
in (Kribus and Mittelman, 2008; Vorobiev et al., 2006a,b).
The bottoming heat engine, mentioned in the aforemen-
tioned works, has been replaced by an ORC engine, which
has proved its reliability and the variety of applications
used. Only a relevant approach is reported by NASA in
the 1980s for incorporation of organic Rankine cycles in
photovoltaic modules for applications in their space
stations (Chubb, 1987; Hallinan, 1987), but this research
did not reach concrete results, and later was abandoned,
since the installation of such components in zero-gravity
environment is prohibitive (Macauleya and Davis, 2002).
The design of the system is described in the following
sections, along with a preliminary optimization study, in
order to specify the most efficient design point, by further
investigating some parameters, such as the concentration
ratio and the organic fluid’s mass flow rate. The latter
has an important contribution, since it is correlated directly
to the evaporation temperature of the organic fluid and the
operational temperature of the PV cells. The system’s sim-
ulation is also presented, calculating the combined perfor-
mance for two characteristic time-periods, a winter one and
a summer one. In addition, the annual simulation of the
optimized system takes place, pointing out the overall per-
formance at mixed full and partial loads too and compar-
ing it with the performance of an equivalent system without
the incorporation of the ORC. Finally, an economic anal-
ysis is implemented, in order to reveal, if the suggested inte-
grated system performs better in economic terms than the
same one without the ORC.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Description of the system
A simplified diagram showing the basic design aspects is
shown in Fig. 1. The process can be briefly described as fol-
lows: The incident solar radiation on the reflectors is con-
centrated on the cells’ area and is partly converted to
electric power (PPV), following the electric efficiency of
the CPV module. The heat produced on the PV cells is
transferred to the absorber of the module and is convected
by the organic fluid (QORC), which is then preheated and
evaporated. The evaporation temperature is a parameter,
which depends on the operational temperature of the cells
and will be elaborated in another section of the present
work. The refrigerant R-245fa has been selected for this
organic cycle due to its appropriate thermodynamic
properties (Critical Point: Tcr = 154.05 °C, Pcr = 36.4 bar)
in the defined temperature range and because it is
Thermal energy
Solar radiation (G)
Mechanical energy
Reflectors
Electric energy
Concentrated solar
radiation (xG)
QORC WT
CPV ORC Generator
PPV PORC
Fig. 1. Basic operation principle of the investigated system.
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324 311

environmentally friendly. According to the findings of pre- The various temperatures shown in Fig. 2 are represen-
vious studies of the present authors (Kosmadakis et al., tative values derived from the design of the system that
2009a; Tchanche et al.,2009, 2010), the specific organic fluid follows.
has an increased thermodynamic efficiency and is capable
of operating in quite high temperatures, such as the ones
2.2. Design of the system
met in CPV/T systems, even higher than 100 °C. The evap-
orated organic fluid is then driven to the expander of the
In this section the design of the investigated system is
cycle, where mechanical power is produced (WT). The
described, along with the proper selection of the size of
organic fluid, having a quite low temperature (in the order
each component. It should be mentioned that the system
of 40 °C), which increases the overall efficiency, is then con-
is of small-scale, in the order of few kWs, and the design
densed in a cooling unit, which can also operate with air,
is as simple as possible, increasing at the same time the reli-
because of the low refrigerant’s mass flow rate and its
ability. For this purpose the control unit of the system
decreased temperature. Finally, the condensed organic
turns off the ORC, when the solar radiation is low. Also,
fluid is driven to the pump and the cycle is repeated. The
the selected CPV configuration is the same as that of exist-
efficiency of the ORC is quite low, because it operates in
ing flat plate PV/Thermal collectors, incorporating para-
low temperature range, although it can be of the same mag-
bolic reflectors and the ORC. In addition, a sun-tracking
nitude with the CPV’s, depending substantially on the
system has been considered, so as to increase the power
operation point. It should be stressed that the mechanical
production of the system. The above design aspects are
power produced by the Rankine engine is driven to an elec-
the same as those applied to low concentration systems
tric generator, in order for additional electric power to be
and the design principles do not deviate from these prevail-
produced (PORC). Therefore, the final product of the sys-
ing in installed PV/T systems.
tem is the sum of electric energy produced by CPV/T and
For the design of the module the total area is chosen to
ORC. The ORC mechanical power can be alternatively
be equal to 1 m2. The results obtained can be extrapolated
used for other applications as well, such as desalination
for bigger sizes of small-scale systems. Taking into consid-
of seawater with the incorporation of a reverse osmosis
eration this assumed area, the concentration ratio and the
(RO) unit.
power production of the module can be calculated. There
The combination of the two technologies seems to be
are many combinations of the two aforementioned param-
very straightforward, since heat, which is the by-product
eters that satisfy this reference area, but a concentration
of the CPV, is recovered by the ORC. The pump of the
ratio that is technically feasible without involving extre-
organic fluid can be driven directly from electricity pro-
mely complex design and has been also experimentally
duced from the CPV module. Moreover, the condensation
explored in relevant systems, is in the order of 10 (Rosell
unit of the ORC can be very compact, since the organic
et al., 2005). This value will be used for the current preli-
fluid undergoes a substantially temperature decrease in
minary design. Of course, after the optimization of the inte-
the expander (having a quite low temperature at the expen-
grated system takes place, this parameter can change. The
der outlet), and the R-245fa mass flow rate, which will be
total electric power production is found, by introducing the
defined in the next sections of the present work, is quite
electric efficiency of the module, the optical efficiency and
low. This means that the total energy consumed to conden-
the efficiency of the inverter. This analysis takes place for
sate the organic fluid and the organic fluid’s pump capacity
the design point, for which the values for air temperature
can be further reduced. A critical issue that must be
Ta = 25 °C and direct solar radiation G = 1000 W/m2
brought into attention is the refrigerant after the expansion
(1 sun) are used.
to have a low enthalpy. For this reason more than one
The efficiency of the module is given by the following
expander in series connection can be used, in order to sus-
Eq. (1), according to Skoplaki and Palyvos (2009).
tain the large pressure drop, and to operate with a quite
high efficiency. Some aspects of this thermodynamic opti- nPV ¼ nT ref ½1  bref ðT c  T ref Þ þ clog10 G ð1Þ
mization will be discussed later in this work.
A detailed layout of the system under investigation is The last term of Eq. (1) is taken as zero (Notton et al.,
shown in Fig. 2, where the numbers represent the various 2005; Skoplaki and Palyvos, 2009), since its contribution
components namely: is negligible, especially in low concentration ratios. The
expression for the efficiency becomes then linear depending
(1) CPV/T array, incorporating the preheater and on the cell’s temperature, as Eq. (2) shows.
evaporator of ORC. nPV ¼ nT ref ½1  bref ðT c  T ref Þ ð2Þ
(2) ORC pump.
(3) Expanders of ORC. For the investigated system, the cells used are silicon
(4) Condenser of ORC. ones, available in the market at quite low cost, in contrary
(5) Cooling pump of ORC. to the III–V cells (Yamaguchi et al., 2005). The tempera-
(6) ORC generator. ture coefficient used for these cells is equal to 0.004 C1
(7) Inverter. and is taken from Mattei et al. (2006). Although the
312 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

3
Expander 1 Expander 2
1 Condenser

/T
120 °C 90 °C 50 °C 35 °C
PV
C 4

at -
or ter
or
ap ea
Ev reh
P
30.5 °C 30 °C 25.5 °C 25 °C
2 organic 5
fluid pump
Inverter DC Cooling pump
AC
7
G 6
Generator

Description
Thermometer
To load
Pressure meter
Flow meter
Pyranometer

Fig. 2. Detailed layout of the developed system.

temperature coefficient decreases, when the concentration -Convection

-Radiation
increases, the coefficient for the non-concentrating solar (Back losses)
cells has been applied in the current study, constituting a
conservative approach (Kribus et al., 2006). The reference
temperature is equal to 25 °C and the module efficiency
Insulation
at reference conditions (nTref) is 12% (Zondag, 2008). The Inlet Outlet
optical and inverter efficiency according to Kribus et al.
(2006) are equal to 0.85 and 0.9 respectively. Absorber
Next, some energy values are calculated. The net inci- PV cells
dent concentrated solar radiation on the PV module PV glass

(QPV) taking into consideration the optical efficiency is -Convection

-Radiation
given by Eq. (3). (Front losses)
Reflectors
QPV ¼ GCnopt A ð3Þ

For solar radiation equal to 1 sun (1000 W/m2) the net inci-
dent concentrated solar radiation on the CPV module, by
applying Eq. (3), is 8500 W. QPV is partly transformed to
electric power, according to the electric efficiency (Eq.
(2)), while the rest to thermal energy dissipated both to
the environment and recovered from the ORC for addi-
tional power generation. For this preliminary design, the
cells’ temperature for this concentration ratio and design
is chosen to be 100 °C (Mittelman et al., 2007). Eq. (2)
can be applied, calculating the module electric efficiency
equal to 8.4%, while the electric power produced (PPV)
can be calculated through Eq. (4).
P PV ¼ QPV nPV ninv
By applying Eq. (4), the electric power produced is
634.9 W, while the remaining power (8500  634.9 =
7865.1W) is allocated to the inverter losses (QPVnPV
(1  ninv) = 70.5W) and to the thermal power produced
(QTh = QPV (1  nPV) = 7794.6Wth). The validity of the
last equation is under the assumption that the absorptivity
of the PV cells is equal to unity, which is quite true, since
Fig. 3. Simplified configuration of the PV components.
this parameter takes high values and additionally some of
the reflected radiation on the cells bounces to the reflectors
and the cover glass and returns back to the cells. This typ-
ical energy balance shows that most of the incident radia-
tion is transformed into heat. Assuming steady-state
operation, the thermal energy balance of the module (see
Fig. 3) to achieve thermal equilibrium gives Eq. (5).
QTh ¼ QORC þ Qconv þ Qrad
ð4Þ ¼ QORC þ ½hAðT gl  T a Þ þ hAðT ins  T a Þ
þ ½eArðT 4gl  T 4a Þ þ eArðT 4ins  T 4sky Þ ð5Þ
The heat transfer coefficient (h) has been chosen to be the
same for both top and bottom faces (the side face losses have
been neglected) and equal to 8.8 W/m2/K corresponding to
wind velocity of 2 m/s, by using the formula h = 2.8 + 3uwind
(Chow, 2003), Tsky, the sky temperature equals to T sky ¼
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324 313

0:0552T 1:5
a (Ji et al., 2008). For the calculation of the compo- For the PV cells:
nents’ temperature a simulation code has been developed, dT PV k PV gl APV k PV abs APV
which is analysed herein. mPV cp;PV ¼ ðT gl  T PV Þ þ
dt dPV dPV
The simulation is based on the time-dependent one-
dimensional energy balance of every layer of the CPV/T  ðT abs  T PV Þ þ QTh ð7Þ
collector. Five different components are considered, follow- For the absorber:
ing closely the methodology described in Chow (2003), and
each component is considered to have a uniform tempera- dT abs k absPV Aabs k absins Aabs
mabs cp;abs ¼ ðT PV  T abs Þ þ
ture distribution during each time-step. For clarity, the dt dabs dabs
equations used and some simulation techniques are pre-  ðT ins  T abs Þ  QORC ð8Þ
sented and briefly discussed here as well.
The five components are namely the cover PV glass, the For the insulation:
photovoltaic cells, the absorber, the refrigerant and the dT ins
mins cp;ins ¼ hins Ains ðT a  T ins Þ þ eins rAins ðT 4sky  T 4ins Þ
insulation. At each time-step every component has a spa- dt
tially uniform distributed temperature, since it was shown k insabs Ains
þ ðT abs  T ins Þ ð9Þ
in Chow (2003) that a larger number of segments represent- dins
ing each component do not influence the calculated results.
For the organic fluid:
Some basic inputs to the code is the incident concentrated
radiation, where the radiation used is obtained considering dT fl
mfl cp;fl ¼ m_ R245fa ðhin  hout Þ þ QORC ð10Þ
a one-axis tracking system, the ambient temperature and dt
the wind velocity for the calculation of the heat transfer In the above equations m is the mass of each component (cal-
coefficient. Such data are derived from Typical Meteoro- culated as the product of density multiplied by the volume,
logical Year (TMY) data, and the ones that will be used m = qV = qAd), referring to each component accordingly.
in the current simulations are for the area of Athens, The thermal properties used, together with some basic
Greece. Other additional input parameters are the concen- dimensions, are the same as in Zondag et al. (2002), Wong
tration ratio, some basic dimensions of the various layers, et al. (2008), Xu et al. (2009), and Rosell et al. (2005), and
their densities, their thermal properties (conductivity, heat are shown in Table 1.
capacity), the values of the various efficiencies (inverter’s, According to Kribus et al. (2006), and Mittelman et al.
generator’s etc.) and an initial estimation of the different (2007) the coolant outlet temperature is approximately
temperatures, used as initial condition, from which the final 10 °C lower than the cell temperature, estimating the refrig-
calculations are independent. erant temperature at the outlet approximately 90 °C. This
After the transient 1-D energy equations are composed, value will be investigated more in detail in another section
they are linearised and a system of five equations with five of the present work, in order to optimise some basic design
unknowns is formed, which is solved iteratively until con- parameters of the system under investigation. The R-245fa
vergence is reached. This takes place for each time-step, condensation temperature has been chosen to be equal to
where the temperature values of the previous time-step 30 °C, a quite low value, in order to increase the thermody-
are taken into consideration and included in the transient namic efficiency of the Rankine cycle and also to minimize
term. The time-step used here is one hour (3600 s). Simula- the power consumption of the ORC’s cooling unit. The
tion runs using a smaller time-step demand much more isentropic efficiencies of the expansion and the pumping
computational time and more importantly the calculated process have been also introduced and are both equal to
results do not significantly deviate. 0.85. With all the above values the thermodynamic cycle
For each component the energy balance equation used is properties of R-245fa can be defined, and are shown in
shown below, illustrating the rate of its temperature varia- Table 2, while in Fig. 4 the pressure/enthalpy diagram of
tion (transient term – left-hand side of the following equa- R-245fa is displayed, showing the organic Rankine cycle.
tions), the heat loss to the ambient (through convection For design purposes only, Eqs. (6)–(10) are applied,
and radiation), the incident radiation and the heat flows ignoring their transient terms (left side of the equations
between the various components. In the expression of
Eq. (6) the radiation term includes the ambient tempera-
Table 1
ture and not the sky temperature, since the cover glass faces Thermal properties and thickness of the components.
the reflectors.
Component Specific heat Density Conductivity Thickness
For the PV cover glass: capacity (q: kg/m3) (k: W/m/K) (d: mm)
(cp: J/kg/K)

dT gl Cover PV glass 840 2600 1.4 3

mgl cp;gl ¼ hgl Agl ðT a  T gl Þ þ egl rAgl ðT 4a  T 4gl Þ PV cells 760 2330 145 0.3
dt Absorber 900 2700 237 2
k glPV Agl (aluminum)
þ ðT PV  T gl Þ þ Qinc agl ð6Þ Insulation 950 2000 0.02 50
dgl
314 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

Table 2
Thermodynamic properties of states of R-245fa.
Point State Temperature (°C) Pressure (bar) Enthalpy (kJ/kg) Entropy (kJ/kg/K)
1 Saturated vapor 90 10.044 470.48 1.7925
20 Superheated vapor (isentropic) 42 1.7904 438.64 1.7925
2 Superheated vapor 49 1.7904 445.01 1.8137
200 Saturated vapor 30 1.7904 427.50 1.7570
3 Saturated liquid 30 1.7904 239.60 1.1372
40 Sub-cooled liquid (isentropic) 30.3 10.044 240.24 1.1372
4 Sub-cooled liquid 30.4 10.044 240.35 1.1377
400 Saturated liquid 90 10.044 325.68 1.3938

Fig. 4. Pressure/enthalpy chart for R-245fa.

equals to zero), so that the temperature of every component
can be calculated. It should be stated that the summation of
the steady-state version of Eqs. (6)–(10) results to Eq. (5).
The latter is applied for the calculation of the heat recovered
by the ORC, which is found to be equal to 6791Wth.
Having Table 2 in mind, together with the recovered
heat from the ORC for additional power production, Eq.
(11) is used to calculate the R-245fa mass flow rate ðm_ ORC Þ.
QORC
m_ ORC ¼
ðhout  hin Þ
The mass flow rate is found to be 0.029509 kg/s.
Also, the ORC pump consumption (Pp,ORC) is obtained
from Eq. (12).
m_ ORC ðhp;out  hp;in Þ
P p;ORC ¼
np
np equals to 0.75. The pump consumption at the design
point is 29.5 W.
The power production of the ORC is given by Eq. (13).
P ORC ¼ m_ ORC ðhT ;in  hT ;out Þnex nG ð13Þ
nex and nG equal to 0.85 and 0.9 respectively. The electric
power production of the ORC is calculated 574.97 W.
The net system’s electric efficiency is given from Eq. (14).
P PV þ P ORC  P p;ORC  P cool
ð11Þ nCPV ORC ¼ ð14Þ
GCA
Pcool is taken equal to 2% of the incident radiation power,
according to Mittelman et al. (2007). The calculated elec-
tric efficiency from Eq. (14) is then 9.81%, which is much
higher than the gross electric efficiency of the CPV system
solely (6.35%). Moreover, the power production of the
ð12Þ
CPV and the ORC system is approximately the same,
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324 315

showing that the integrated investigated system brings a
substantial increase not only to the efficiency, but also to
the performance of the CPV system, without increasing sig-
nificantly the complexity and the total cost.
2.3. Optimization of the system
There is still margin for performance improvement
through further optimization of several parameters. Two
of the most important variables affecting the system’s
performance are the concentration ratio, which shows
the incident energy intensity on the CPV module, and the
refrigerant’s mass flow rate. The latter determines the
energy balance between the CPV and the ORC system.
Both the aforementioned parameters are investigated, so
that an improved design is achieved and gain additional
knowledge, on the operational characteristics of the sys-
tem. As soon as the design optimization is done, the year
round simulation takes place, revealing the performance
of the system at full and partial loads too.
2.3.1. Effect of concentration ratio
This section deals with the effect of the concentration on
the overall efficiency and performance of the integrated sys-
tem. In order to make clear to what extent the available
heat affects the ORC and the net electric efficiency, the
thermodynamic cycle is not altered. Therefore, the
R-245fa thermodynamic state properties are the same, as
already shown in Table 2. Also, the various coefficients
used (e.g. the pump’s efficiency, the expander’s efficiency
etc.) are also kept the same. By applying the same method-
ology described previously, the values of Table 3 are calcu-
lated, showing both the efficiency and power values, as a
function of the concentration ratio and its effect on the
overall performance of the system.
It is observed that as the concentration increases, the
power production becomes larger as well, but the most
important result is that the total efficiency rises consider-
ably, especially for low concentration values. However,
for higher values, in the order of 40–100, the increase is less
steep. The results of Table 3 show that a high concentra-
tion is desired for increasing not only the power produc-
tion, but also the total efficiency of the integrated system.
As the concentration infinitely increases (C ? 1), the total
efficiency asymptotically approaches the value of 10.79%,
which is the upper threshold for the specific design selected,
as was also noticed by Kribus and Mittelman (2008). The
initial selection of C = 10 is considered to be quite efficient
and satisfactory, but it seems that C = 40 is actually a bet-
ter compromise between higher efficiency and low reflec-
tors’ complexity, and this value will be used next.
2.3.2. Effect of refrigerant’s mass flow rate and cells’
temperature
It should be noticed that the heat recovery of the ORC
largely depends on the refrigerant’s mass flow rate,
expressed in Eq. (11). Its value influences the cells’ temper-
ature, as has been concluded by many researchers, who tried
to calculate the mass flow rate, for which the combined elec-
tric and thermal efficiency is maximized (Kalogirou, 2001;
Kribus et al., 2006; Rosell et al., 2005). This dependence will
be studied in the current section, aiming to increase further
the total efficiency of the integrated system.
When the cells’ temperature changes, the thermody-
namic cycle of the organic fluid alters accordingly. There-
fore, the values of Table 2 cannot be used any further,
and for every cell temperature the thermodynamic state
properties of the refrigerant are re-calculated. Only the
condensation temperature remains constant (30 °C), mean-
ing that the state 3 (pump inlet) shown in Fig. 4 remains
unchanged. The thermodynamic state properties of the var-
ious thermodynamic cycles with variable evaporating tem-
perature under investigation are presented in Table 4,
following the enthalpy notation of Fig. 4.
For the improved system, various simulation runs have
been implemented, investigating the effect of the R-245fa
evaporating temperature on the overall performance of
the system, by applying again the same methodology
described in the previous section, for the calculation of the
efficiency and the power values. Table 5 presents the effect
of the cells’ temperature and refrigerant’s mass flow rate
on the system’s efficiency and electric power production. It
should be reminded that in the elaboration of the simulation
code, it was considered that the R-245fa evaporation tem-
perature is 10 °C lower than the cells’ temperature.
While the evaporating temperature approaches the crit-
ical point of R-245fa (Tcr = 154.05 °C), the system’s effi-
ciency declines. This can be expected by also looking at

Table 3
Power and efficiency values as function of the concentration ratio.
Performance values Concentration ratio (–)
C=2 C=5 C = 10 C = 15 C = 20 C = 40 C = 60 C = 100
CPV power (kW) 0.127 0.318 0.635 0.953 1.272 2.598 3.898 6.498
Heat recovery from ORC (kW) 0.513 2.867 6.791 10.72 14.64 30.33 45.99 77.32
ORC power (kW) 0.043 0.243 0.575 0.907 1.239 2.568 3.894 6.547
R-245fa mass flow rate (kg/s) 0.002 0.012 0.029 0.047 0.064 0.132 0.199 0.336
ORC pump power (kW) 0.002 0.012 0.029 0.047 0.064 0.132 0.199 0.336
Cooling pump and sun-tracking power (kW) 0.040 0.100 0.200 0.300 0.400 0.800 1.200 2.000
Net power production (kW) 0.128 0.449 0.981 1.513 2.047 4.234 6.393 10.709
Total efficiency (%) 6.40 8.98 9.81 10.09 10.24 10.58 10.65 10.71
316 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

Table 4
Thermodynamic states properties and efficiency for various evaporating temperature.
Energy values R-245fa evaporation temperature (°C)
70 90 110 130 150
Expander inlet (h1 – kJ/kg) 456.85 470.48 482.53 491.19 487.81
Expander outlet (h2 – kJ/kg) 438.97 445.01 450.42 450.91 444.83
Pump inlet (h3 – kJ/kg) 239.60 239.60 239.60 239.60 239.60
Pump outlet (h4 – kJ/kg) 239.99 240.35 240.86 241.56 242.51
Thermodynamic efficiency (%) 8.0650 10.742 12.765 15.351 16.335

Table 5
Power and efficiency values illustrating the effect of the refrigerant’s mass flow rate and cells’ temperature.
PV cells’ temperature (°C)
80 100 120 140 160
CPV power (kW) 2.888 2.598 2.302 2.012 1.716
Heat recovery from ORC (kWth) 30.28 30.33 30.38 30.43 30.48
ORC power (kW) 1.909 2.568 3.088 3.756 4.085
R-245fa mass flow rate (kg/s) 0.139 0.132 0.126 0.122 0.124
ORC pump power (kW) 0.054 0.132 0.159 0.237 0.361
Cooling pump and sun-tracking power (kW) 0.800 0.800 0.800 0.800 0.800
Net power production (kW) 3.943 4.234 4.431 4.731 4.640
Total efficiency (%) 9.86 10.58 11.08 11.83 11.60

Fig. 5. Pressure/enthalpy chart of the improved thermodynamic cycle for R-245fa.

Table 4, where for the evaporation temperature of 150 °C
(PV cells’ temperature equal to 160 °C in that case), the effi-
ciency does not increase significantly. Additionally, as the
cells’ temperature increases, the heat recovered from the
ORC increases as well, although the heat losses due to con-
vection and radiation to the ambient increase substantially
too. Nevertheless, the electric power production from the
ORC steadily increases, while that from the CPV decreases,
but the total power production continues to increase, as the
PV cells operate at higher temperatures. The results shown
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324
in Table 5 can introduce an optimization trend, revealing
the necessity for the ORC to recover high temperature heat
(in the order of 130–140 °C) and increasing its thermody-
namic efficiency. By doing so, the total system’s efficiency
is increased as well. However, it can be seen that the vari-
ation of the refrigerant’s mass flow rate in every case is
small. Since the system performs better at higher evapora-
tion temperature, the design point alters, taking into con-
sideration the results of this analysis. The improved
thermodynamic cycle of R-245fa is shown in Fig. 5, where
the R-245fa evaporation temperature of 130 °C can be
seen.
The current optimization studies have shown that the
initial preliminary design of the system can be improved.
By increasing the concentration ratio to 40 and establishing
the evaporation temperature of R-245fa at 130 °C, by actu-
ally decreasing the organic fluid’s mass flow rate, the sys-
tem’s efficiency that initially was 9.81%, has reached the
value of 11.83%.
Apparently, further minor parameters can be studied,
such as the condensation temperature of R-245fa, the heat
transfer process etc. Emphasis should also be given to the
total electric power production increase, which has been
doubled for almost all cases, when incorporating the
ORC system, in contrary to the power production of the
CPV system solely.
3. Results and discussion
In this section the daily and annual simulation results
are presented. The main scope of this study is to calculate
the electric energy produced and the efficiency in variable
loads as well. The design of the system has shown that at
the design operational point the efficiency radically
increases in comparison to the CPV system without the
incorporation of the ORC system. The current simulation
purpose is to determine, if the same also stands for mixed
partial and full loads.
A basic technique applied in the elaboration of the sim-
ulation code is that when sufficient incident radiation
exists, the temperature of the PV cells increases, reaching
the nominal operational temperature of 140 °C. At that
moment the ORC is coupled to the CPV module for recov-
ering the available heat. In the cases, where the radiation is
low and the PV cells’ temperature does not reach this pre-
defined temperature, the ORC is decoupled from the CPV
module, in order for the cells to further increase their tem-
perature, until this temperature level is reached resulting to
ORC initiation of operation. Decoupling usually takes
place early in the morning and late in the afternoon, when
the solar radiation is low and sometimes during whole win-
ter and cloudy days.
3.1. Daily simulation of the system
The analysis of the simulation results begins with the
comparison of the performance of the integrated system
317
for two characteristic days, a winter and a summer one
(15th of January and 15th of July). The calculation code
developed is applied for the transient simulation of the inte-
grated system and the efficiency and the electric power pro-
duced are calculated for these characteristic days. The
results are shown in Table 6, where the different operational
conditions between those days can be clearly seen. Fig. 6
shows the instantaneous power production from the CPV
and the ORC system, along with the incident non-concen-
trated solar radiation for two characteristic time-periods.
The winter period corresponds to January 15th adjacent
days and the summer to July 15th respectively.
During the summer period it is observed from Fig. 6
that the direct solar radiation is almost two times higher
and so is the total electric power production from the
CPV and the ORC. This explains, why the efficiency is
quite close for these two periods. Also, the power produc-
tion during the summer lasts longer, providing an increased
cumulative energy production, as shown in Table 6, which
is approximately three times higher than that during the
winter days.
The ORC’s, CPV’s and total efficiency can be seen in
Fig. 7 for the two periods examined. The ORC system oper-
ates fewer hours than the CPV, since early in the morning
and late in the afternoon there is not sufficient heat to
recover. Also, a significant discrepancy of the efficiency
trend cannot be distinguished between the two periods.
The temperature of some components can be observed
in Fig. 8. The cover glass and the cells have a very similar
temperature, while the absorber has almost identical tem-
perature with the cells, and this is the reason that has been
omitted from this Fig. 8. The cells have an almost steady
temperature for many hours per day, especially during
the summer period, where they operate at maximum load
continually for approximately 8 h/day during winter and
12 h/day during summer. The insulation temperature is
close to the ambient temperature having the same trend,
since this layer has an extremely low thermal conductivity
and the portion of heat that reaches this component is
small.
In the simulation the thermodynamic cycle is considered
steady, by varying the R-245fa mass flow rate. However,
sufficient solar radiation should be available to fulfil this
Table 6
Comparison of the efficiency and performance of the integrated system for
characteristic winter and summer days (15th of January and 15th of July).
Winter Summer
day day
Concentrated incident radiation (kWh) 55.5 171.0
CPV electric energy production (kWh) 2.83 8.50
Heat recovery from ORC (kWhth) 30.9 100.0
ORC electric energy production (kWh) 3.81 12.3
ORC pump energy (kWh) 0.32 1.04
Cooling pump and sun-tracking energy (kWh) 1.11 3.42
Net energy production (kWh) 5.21 16.34
Mean daily efficiency (%) 9.39 9.56
318 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

5000 1000
Power production from ORC
Power production from CPV

Electric power production (W)

July

Direct solar radiation (W/m2)

Direct solar radiation
4000 800

3000 January 600

2000 400

1000 200

0 0
312 328 344 360 376 3936 3952 3968 3984 4000
Hours (h)

Fig. 6. Power production and incident solar radiation for 15th of January and 15th of July adjacent days.

0.2
ORC efficiency
CPV efficiency
Total efficiency
0.15
January July
Efficiency (-)

0.1

0.05

0
312 328 344 360 376 3936 3952 3968 3984 4000

Hours (h)

Fig. 7. Efficiencies for 15th of January and 15th of July adjacent days.

PV cells temperature
200 PV glass temperature
Insulation temperature
Ambient temperature
160 January July
Temperature (0C)

120

80

40

0
312 328 344 360 376 3936 3952 3968 3984 4000

Hours (h)

Fig. 8. Components and ambient temperature for 15th of January and 15th of July adjacent days.
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324 319

30000 0.2
Heat recovery of ORC
R245fa mass flow rate
July
25000

R-245fa mass flow rate (kg/s)

Heat recovery of ORC (W)
0.15
20000

January
15000 0.1

10000
0.05
5000

0 0
312 328 344 360 376 3936 3952 3968 3984 4000
Hours (h)

Fig. 9. Heat recovery of ORC and R-245fa mass flow rate for 15th of January and 15th of July adjacent days.

Table 7
Comparison of the annual efficiency and performance of the integrated system.
Annual values CPV–ORC system CPV system
Cells’ temperature (°C)
40 60 80 100 120
Concentrated incident radiation (kWh) 76189 76189
CPV electric energy production (kWh) 3735.8 6520.2 5961.6 5403.8 4846.8 4290.8
ORC electric energy production (kWh) 6339.4 –
Heat recovery of ORC (kWhth) 51357.0 –
ORC pump energy (kWh) 537.64 –
Cooling pump and sun-tracking energy (kWh) 1523.78 1523.78
Net energy production (kWh) 8013.78 4996.4 4437.8 3880.0 3323.0 2767.0
Mean annual efficiency (%) 10.52 6.56 5.82 5.09 4.36 3.63

condition (i.e. increase of the cells’ operational temperature
to the desired level). By doing so, the integrated system
operates for many hours at the design point, fostering the
power production and efficiency. In the design process
the aforementioned operational characteristics demand a
“smart” control system, which could have as an input the
solar radiation, the ambient temperature, the PV cells’ tem-
perature etc., to determine the R-245fa mass flow rate
accordingly. Since the available heat for the ORC varies
as a function of time, it is concluded that the R-245fa mass
flow rate is a time-dependent variable, linearly correlated
to the heat recovery. In Fig. 9 the heat recovery from the
ORC and the R-245fa mass flow rate can be seen for two
characteristic time-periods.
The maximum heat recovered from the ORC during the
summer is approximately two times higher than that during
the winter and also it is observed that the ORC operation
time is almost double during the summer (around 12
instead of 6 h per day during winter).
3.2. Annual simulation of the system
The same transient simulation code has been applied for
the annual performance evaluation of the system, in order
to investigate in detail the system behaviour under partial
loads. The weather data are those of Athens, Greece, and
the direct solar radiation corresponds to one-axis sun-
tracking system. Sun tracking is incorporated into the
CPV, in order to boost the power production mainly dur-
ing the winter period. Nevertheless, the system’s efficiency
remains almost the same.
The integrated system will be compared to a similar sys-
tem, which does not incorporate an ORC, but carries a
cooling unit to keep the cells’ temperature low. Complete
calculated results concerning performance values are pre-
sented in Table 7, including the electric power produced
by the CPV and ORC and the total annual efficiency. Also,
Table 7 includes the annual results derived from the simu-
lation of the system, for sole CPV/T configuration for dif-
ferent cells’ temperature, to enable the comparison of
performance and power increase due to the incorporation
of the ORC system.
By examining Table 7 interesting results can be
observed. The electric energy production from the ORC
is much higher than that from the CPV, due to the high
operational temperature chosen. In the case of a sole
CPV system, as the cells’ temperature decreases, the annual
efficiency increases rapidly with a constant rate of approx-
320 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324

Annual values 1000

Energy production from ORC (CPV-ORC system) ORC energy
8000
Energy production from CPV (CPV-ORC system) CPV energy
Energy production from CPV (CPV system) Pump energy
7000
ORC pump energy consumption 800
Cumulative energy (kWh)

6000

5000

Energy (kWh)
600
4000

3000
400
2000

1000
200
0
0 2000 4000 6000 8000
Hours (h)
0
Fig. 10. Annual cumulative energy production (kWh) for the CPV–ORC 0 2 4 6 8 10 12
and CPV system.
Months

Fig. 11. Monthly distribution of energy produced by the ORC and CPV
imately 0.035%/°C. Nevertheless, even for the low cell tem- systems and consumed by the ORC pump.
perature of 40 °C, the CPV efficiency is much lower than
the annual efficiency of the CPV–ORC system. But under
12000
a concentration ratio of 40, decreasing the cells’ tempera- Direct incident radiation
ture down to 40 °C is technically difficult, since the cooling Heat recovery of ORC
unit should dissipate a large amount of heat, increasing the 10000
complexity of the system. A cell temperature in the range of
60–100 °C is more realistic (Kribus and Mittelman, 2008),
where the efficiency is even lower and approximately two 8000
times smaller than the efficiency of the CPV–ORC system.
Energy (kWh)

This increase that the integrated system brings not only

to the efficiency, but also to the annual electric energy pro- 6000

duction is attributed to the exploitation of the rejected heat

of the CPV for additional power production. The temporal
4000
distribution of this power can be seen in Fig. 10, where the
cumulative energy flows are shown. From 3000 up to
6000 h of the year the curves become steeper, since this per- 2000
iod corresponds to summer season, where the energy inten-
sity of the system is high. The energy produced from the
ORC is always higher than that produced from the CPV 0

solely. In the same Fig. 10 is also shown the annual cumu- 0 2 4 6 8 10 12

lative energy production from the CPV system, when the
cell temperature is maintained below 80 °C.
In order to identify easier the seasonal performance of
the system, the monthly variation of the energy produced
by the ORC and CPV system and the energy consumed
by the ORC pump are shown in Fig. 11. The incident solar
radiation and the heat recovery of the ORC system are
shown in Fig. 12. Both Figs. 11 and 12 reveal the perfor-
mance improvement of the system under investigation dur-
ing the summer months, as was expected.
3.3. Cost analysis of the systems
A cost analysis follows to identify the specific cost of the
examined system. The analysis will be based on the method-
ology presented in (Kalogirou and Tripanagnostopoulos,
Months
Fig. 12. Monthly distribution of thermal energy recovery of the ORC and
incident radiation.
2007; Kosmadakis et al., 2009c; Mittelman et al., 2007).
Since concentrating PV modules have not yet been greatly
commercialized, manufacturing companies have been
recently established resulting to lack of long-tem experi-
ence. Therefore, it is difficult to make reliable estimations
concerning their specific installation cost (Luque et al.,
2006). According to a recent work (Mittelman et al.,
2009), there is considerable uncertainty on the specific
installation cost of a CPV system, depending on the scale
and technologies incorporated (e.g. solar cells,
sun-tracking system). There are reported purchase costs
concerning prototype CPV systems (Kribus et al., 2006),
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324
whose economic values can be indicative. Most of the
reported specific costs found in the literature (Kribus
et al., 2006; Mittelman et al., 2007, 2009), refer mainly to
high concentration ratio systems, above 200 suns, whose
specific cost is in the range of 2–6 €/WP, when the CPV also
includes a sun-tracking system and high-efficiency solar
cells.
It should be mentioned that the analysis presented here
does not take into consideration the CO2 avoidance costs.
If this environmental cost were taken into consideration,
the economic performance of both systems investigated
(CPV–ORC and CPV system) would be higher.
3.3.1. Estimation of the system’s installation cost
For the present economic study the specific installation
cost of the combined CPV–ORC system is supposed to be
equal to the one of a small-scale PV/T module equipped
with conventional Silicon cells, and equal to 1000 €/m2, a
slightly higher value than that used in Kalogirou and
Tripanagnostopoulos (2007), and Tripanagnostopoulos
et al. (2005), and with an additional specific cost concerning
the purchase and installation of the reflectors equal to
50 €/m2 of reflector’s area. Also, the cost of the other elec-
trical parts of the system (e.g. inverter, control unit, cables,
sun-tracking system) is in the order of 0.6 €/We,PV (Tripan-
agnostopoulos et al., 2005). The above cost estimations
result to a specific cost of slightly higher than 2 €/WP. The
specific cost of the ORC system is considerably low, since
it consists of market-available components (Manolakos
et al., 2007, 2009a). For the present study the specific cost
chosen is 2 €/We,ORC, according to Kosmadakis et al.
(2009c), Schuster et al. (2009), and Chacartegui et al.
(2009), where recent economic figures are reported. In the
aforementioned specific cost the generator’s cost is also
included.
The annual costs are taken into consideration too,
which include the operational, maintenance and insurance
cost. The first two costs are significantly low for CPV sys-
tems and they can be neglected. The sum of these three
costs is taken to be equal to 1% of the total installation
cost. Some additional parameters used are that the eco-
nomic lifetime of the system is 20 years and the interest rate
is 3%. In Table 8 the various installation costs and the
annual cost can be seen for the two systems under investi-
gation. In the current analysis the CPV system operating at
140 °C (Table 7) has been considered in the calculations.
Table 8
Comparison of the installation and annual cost for the CPV–ORC and the
CPV system.
Cost CPV–ORC system
CPV installation cost (€) 3000
ORC installation cost (€) 7512
Electrical parts installation cost (€) 1207.20
Total installation cost (€) 11719.20
Total annual cost (€) 117.19
Power production (kW) 5.768
321
The system is supposed to be connected to the grid. There-
fore, the economic gain equals to the electricity cost of every
kWh supplying the electric grid, which for the current study
is a varying parameter and it takes values from 0.1–0.4 €/
kWh (the lower values correspond to energy cost related to
conventional power production, while the higher one to
feed-in-tariff). It should be reminded that the annual net elec-
tric energy production for the CPV–ORC system and the CPV
system is 8013.78 kWh and 2212.02 kWh respectively.
3.3.2. Economic analysis of the systems
The present section regards the economic analysis of the
system, where the parameter concerning the electricity cost
will vary from 0.1–0.4 €/kWh. Also, its comparison with a
sole CPV system will be presented. Next, the basic method-
ology is deployed for the calculation of the economic per-
formance of the two systems.
The coefficient that correlates a future cash flow with a
present value is called the present value coefficient and is
given by the following Eq. (14).
CF t¼n
CF t¼0 ¼ n ð14Þ
ð1 þ rÞ
The net present value (NPV), which is actually the pres-
ent value of the total cash flows during the economic life
cycle of a system, is given next by Eq. (15).
X
n Xn
Bt¼j C t¼j
NPV ¼ Bt¼0  C t¼o ¼ j  j ð15Þ
j¼0 ð1 þ rÞ j¼0 ð1 þ rÞ
The Pay-Back-Period (PBP) is the time-period in years
required for the NPV to reach a zero value and is found
by solving Eq. (15) with NPV = 0 €, using the following
Eq. (16).
X
PBP
Bt¼j X
PBP
C t¼j
j ¼ j ð16Þ
j¼0 ð1 þ rÞ j¼0 ð1 þ rÞ
By applying Eq. (15), the NPV can be calculated for
varying electricity energy cost. In Fig. 13 the NPV can be
seen for both systems under consideration during their life
cycle for four characteristic specific electricity energy costs,
namely 0.10, 0.15, 0.20 and 0.40 €/kWh.
For the lower electricity cost (left diagram of Fig. 13)
both systems at the end of their economic life have a neg-
ative NPV, meaning that the cumulative gain will be nega-
tive after 20 years. The same stands also for the CPV
system, when the electricity cost is 0.15 €/kWh, having a
zero NPV after 20 years of operation, while the CPV–
ORC system has a positive gain. When the electricity cost
is further increased and becomes equal to 0.20 €/kWh, both
CPV system systems have a positive gain, while for the CPV–ORC sys-
3000
tem being much higher. For higher electricity costs the
– CPV–ORC system performs much better in economic
1207.20 terms than the CPV system, having always a higher positive
4207.20 NPV, as shown in Fig. 13 for the 0.40 €/kWh case.
42.07 In order to have a more clear view of the economic per-
2.012
formance of the two systems, especially when the electricity
322
40000
30000
NPV after 20 years (
20000
10000
-10000
-20000
0 5
Fig. 13. NPV after 20 years of operation for the two systems, as function of the specific electricity cost.
Table 9
Comparison of the annual costs for the CPV–ORC and the CPV system.
Specific electricity cost (€/kWh) Pay-Back-Period (years)
CPV–ORC system
0.10 25
0.15 14
0.20 10
0.40 5 6
cost is low, the life cycle has been extended beyond 20 years
of operation, so as to calculate the PBP, in other words the
specific year, when afterwards the NPV of the system
becomes positive. In Table 9 the PBP is presented for both
systems as a function of the electricity cost.
For the electricity cost of 0.10 €/kWh, the CPV–ORC
performs better than the CPV system, since its PBP is
lower, but still quite higher than its economic life cycle
(20 years). Thus it cannot constitute a viable system from
the economic point of view, but at least it is demonstrated
that also in economic terms predominates to the CPV sys-
tem for every electricity cost considered.
In addition, the annualised cost of energy production of
the two systems has been calculated and is found to be
0.113 €/kWh for the CPV–ORC system and 0.147 €/kWh
for the CPV system, showing that the former constitutes
from the techno-economic aspect a more efficient solution
for power production.
4. Conclusions
In the present study an attempt for improving the CPV
system’s efficiency has been investigated, by combining the
technologies of the concentrating photovoltaics and the
organic Rankine cycles. The heat rejected from the concen-
trating PV is recovered from the ORC, in order to increase
the total electric power production.
 The results of this analysis revealed that CPV–ORC
combination improves the efficiency of CPV technology
from 9.81% to 11.83% in average.
G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324
NPV
CPV - ORC system
CPV system
0.1 /kWh 0.15 /kWh 0.2 /kWh 0.4 /kWh
10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20 0 5 10 15 20
Years (y)
 There are more parameters to be further investigated, in
order to optimise in a greater extent the system’s design,
such as the condensation temperature of R-245fa, the
CPV system heat transfer process at the absorber plate, the selection
42 of more efficient solar cells etc.
20  The annual simulation, showed that the incorporation
13
of the ORC system is responsible for the larger amount
of the electric energy produced (6339.4 kWh for the
ORC system instead of 3735.8 kWh for the CPV sys-
tem). The annual efficiency calculated is 10.52%, which
is quite high, considering that the system operates at
mixed partial and full loads.
 The performance of the integrated system was compared
with the performance of an identical CPV system with-
out the inclusion of the ORC system. Even when the
cell’s temperature of the CPV system was substantially
decreased at 40 °C, the annual efficiency calculated
was 6.56% much lower than the efficiency of the inte-
grated CPV–ORC system. The same also applies for
the annual net electric energy production, showing that
the system developed reaches a much higher energy pro-
duction under the same weather conditions and opera-
tional characteristics, without many modifications to
the CPV system.
 Since the preheater and evaporator of the refrigerant are
incorporated in the CPV/T module, the additional
required components are the ORC expander and pump
and the condenser of the refrigerant, which are market-
available components.
 In the economic analysis realised, the electricity cost was
considered as independent variable and it was shown
that the CPV–ORC system performs better in economic
terms than the CPV system, having a larger and some-
times positive, NPV at the end of its economic life cycle
(20 years) and a shorter pay-back-period. Also, the
annualised cost of energy production of the two systems
was calculated equal to 0.113 €/kWh and 0.147 €/kWh
for the CPV–ORC and the CPV system respectively,
proving that the combined system has a superior eco-
nomic performance than the CPV system.
 G. Kosmadakis et al. / Solar Energy 85 (2011) 308–324
All the above findings, concerning the technical aspects
and the cost analysis, constitute an evidence that the CPV–
ORC system can be an alternative for recovering the heat
from concentrating PVs. Nevertheless, the mechanical
power produced from the expander of the ORC can be
used in other applications as well, except from power pro-
duction (e.g. seawater desalination).
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