Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Energy Conversion and Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/enconman

Integrative passive and active cooling system using PCM and nanofluid for T
thermal regulation of concentrated photovoltaic solar cells
⁎
H.A. Nasefa,b, S.A. Nadaa,c, , Hamdy Hassana,d
a
Department of Energy Resources Engineering, Egypt-Japan University of Science and Technology (E-JUST), P.O. Box 179, New Borg El-Arab City 21934, Alexandria,
Egypt
b
Department of Mech. Power Eng., Faculty of Eng., Tanta University, Tanta, Egypt
c
Mech. Eng. Department, Benha Faculty of Engineering, Benha University, Benha, Egypt
d
Mech. Eng. Department, Faculty of Engineering, Assuit University, Assuit, Egypt

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: An integration of passive and active cooling systems for thermal regulation of concentrated photovoltaic (CPV)
Integrative passive-active cooling system solar system has been developed and modeled. A heat storage battery of phase change material (PCM) is
Concentrated photovoltaic combined with a closed loop water cooling system in the developed design. A two dimensional model has been
Thermal regulation developed for the simulation of the CPV layers with the integrated cooling system. Results have been in-
PCM
vestigated to evaluate the thermal and electrical performances of the system components and the entire system.
Nanofluid
Further investigations have been conducted to study the effects of different arrangements of the PCM plates in
the water tank on the system performances. Enhancing the system performance by using nanofluid as heat
transfer fluid (HTF) was also evaluated. Results showed that the proposed system achieves 60% reduction in the
CPV average temperature compared to the conventional direct PCM-PV and water-cooling individual systems. At
10 concentration ratio (CR) and 0.01 m/s HTF velocity, the cell temperature does not exceed 78 °C. Moreover,
the PCM maximum temperature is kept below the degradation temperature limit. The effect of the PCM plates’
arrangements in the water tank on the system performance is negligible. Using nanofluid as HTF enhancer
increases the CPV efficiency by 2.7% and reduces the PV maximum temperature and the PCM melting time by
4 °C and 12%, respectively.

1. Introduction
Cooling of photovoltaic cells should be maintained to avoid over-
heating, performance losses or permanent failure. Crucial design at-
tentions have been paid for cell thermal regulation solutions including
temperature homogeneity, system durability, system efficiency, and cell
power reduction [1]. Different techniques can be adapted to maintain
the desired temperature limit of the PV. Several aspects should be kept
in mind to accomplish a good cooling system such as; PV power gen-
eration, applied concentrating technology and meteorological condi-
tions of the installation location. The PV thermal regulation techniques
include passive cooling, active cooling or a combination of them. Heat
sink passive cooling is appropriate for cooling of PV cells without
concentrator or with concentrators up to 10 suns [1,2]. The basic form
of the passive cooling system is conducted by using a matrix of good
thermal conductive extended surfaces to improve the heat dissipation to
the surrounding [3]. Other passive solutions use naturally circulated
loop as heat pipes to effectively transfer heat using phase transforma-
tion [4]. Additionally, combined solutions using phase change materials
(PCMs) and heat sink systems [5] were proposed, successfully examined
for PV cells and electronic cooling and enhanced by using nanoparticles
with PCM [6,7]. Evaluation of using PCM for thermal regulations of free
and building integrated PV cells was also experimentally conducted [8].
Investigations on using PCM-heat sink combinations for PV cooling
have been done experimentally [9] and numerically [10] for different
fins spacing and materials [11] at various cell inclination angles. Con-
centrated Photovoltaic system was also modeled numerically to inspect
the effect of changing the inclination angle on the PCM melting process
[12].
Active cooling systems using air, water or other heat transfer fluid
are effective temperature regulating techniques for high power density
packed cells because of their efficient heat dissipation. These active
cooling systems can be conducted either in open loop or closed loop
system. The open loop system has the advantage of reducing the heat

⁎
Corresponding author at: Department of Energy Resources Engineering, Egypt-Japan University of Science and Technology (E-JUST), P.O. Box 179, New Borg El-
Arab City 21934, Alexandria, Egypt.
E-mail address: samehnadar@yahoo.com (S.A. Nada).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2019.112065
Received 3 June 2019; Received in revised form 9 September 2019; Accepted 10 September 2019
Available online 17 September 2019
0196-8904/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Nomenclature δ thickness [m]

η efficiency
A area [m2] λ liquid fraction
Amush mush zone constant [Kg/m3.s] μ viscosity [Pa.s]
Cp specific heat [J/kg.K] ρ density [kg/m3]
CPV concentrator photovoltaic σ Stephan–Boltzmann constant 5.67 × 10−8 (W/m2.K4)
CR concentration ratio τ transmissivity
g gravity acceleration [m/s2] ϕ particle volumetric concentration
G reference solar irradiance [1000 W/m2]
G(t) concentrated solar irradiance [W/m2] Subscripts
h convection heat transfer coefficient [W/m2.K]
H total enthalpy [J/kg] Al aluminum
k thermal conductivity [W/m.K] amb ambient
L latent heat [J/kg] conv convection
ṁ mass flow rate [kg/s] E1 upper EVA layer
p pressure [Pa] E2 lower EVA layer
P power [W] elec electrical
PCM phase change material g glass
Q amount of energy [J] in inlet
q internal heat generation per unit volume [W/m3] ini initial
R reflectivity l liquid
t time [min.] m melting
T temperature [°C] nf nanofluid
v velocity [m/s] np nanoparticles
V volume [m3] rad radiation
ref reference
Greek symbols refl reflected
s solid
ɛ emissivity sc silicon cell
α absorptivity T Tedlar
αt thermal diffusivity [m2/s] th thermal
β solar cell temperature coefficient [1/K] w water
β1 coefficient of thermal expansion [1/K]

transfer resistance of the extra heat exchanger of the closed loop system
and it can be used for thermal conversion efficiency of CR above 150
suns [1]. Heat removal by using impinging jets for PV and electronic
active cooling has been widely used in the industry due to its low
thermal resistance [13]. Additionally, heat transfer between heat
source and heat sink using multiphase flow in heat pipes was experi-
mentally investigated [14] in several applications of solar energy in-
cluding solar water heater and active cooling technique for con-
centrator photovoltaic systems. Moreover, direct immersion of the PV
panel in a dielectric liquid was experimentally investigated [15] as
active cooling technique for solar panel.
Both of active and passive cooling techniques are suitable to linear
concentrators. Passive cooling system is limited for PV applications up
to a concentration ratio of 20 suns [1]. The integration between active
and passive cooling techniques has been recently proposed to enhance
the cooling and regulation of high power concentrated PV systems.
Emam and Ahmed [16] numerically modeled the cooling of the PV cell
with PCM-heat sink surrounded with forced flow of water jacket. The
limitation of their design was the maximum working temperature of
PCM at which degradation occurs which limits the system concentra-
tion ratios. Recently, nanoparticles and nanofluids have been integrated
in CPV cooling systems to enhance heat transfer. Al-Waeli et al. [17]
experimentally investigated the performance of hybrid photovoltaic
thermal PV/T system. The PV was directly coupled with PCM bed and
cooled by nanofluid circulation system. This integration increased the
open circuit voltage by 80%, the power by 96% and the electrical ef-
ficiency by 6.6%. Gaur et al. [18] theoretically studied and compared
the performance of PV/T and PV/T-PCM cooling systems at normal
solar radiation for winter and summer climate conditions. Their find-
ings illustrated that during sunshine hours; using PCM mass with proper
amount decreases the PV temperature and improves its electrical effi-
ciency. Preet et al. [19] experimentally studied the PV/T cooling system
with and without direct contact PCM. It was observed that the cell
temperature in both water-based PV/T and PV/T-PCM systems is less
than that of conventional PV module. Additionally, a maximum de-
crease in the temperature of 47% and 53% was accomplished for PV/T
and PV/T-PCM systems, respectively. Moreover, the electrical effi-
ciency was improved by 230% and 300% in water-based PV/T and PV/
T-PCM systems, respectively. Yang et al. [20] experimentally conducted
an investigation on the effect of integration of directly contacted PCM
into a hybrid PV/T system to store the rejected heat in a separate water
tank. They found that the thermal and electrical efficiencies of PV/T
and PV/T-PCM systems are 58.35%, 69.84%, 6.98%, and 8.16%, re-
spectively. Su et al. [21] presented an experimental investigation to
compare the performance of a tracking-integrated concentrating pho-
tovoltaic-thermal (CPV-T) system with the performance of and im-
mersed encapsulated PCM spheres system. Results showed that, the
average increase of the electrical, thermal, and overall efficiencies of
the CPV-T and PCM integrated cooling system are 10%, 5%, and 15%,
respectively. An experimental investigation on the performance of PV/T
and PV/T-PCM cooling systems was performed by Yang et al. [22]. The
PCM was coupled directly with the PV and the stored heat in the PCM
was extracted by cooling water circulation. It was reported that (i) at a
specified indoor environment with water flow rate of 0.15 m/h and
solar intensity of 800 W/m2, the primary energy-saving efficiency for
the PV/T-PCM system increased by 14% compared to the PV/T system,
and (ii) the integration of PCM into the PV/T system can clearly im-
prove the system energy performance. Siahkamari et al. [23] conducted
an experimental investigation to evaluate the performance of micro-
channel cooled- photovoltaic integrated with direct contact

2
H.A. Nasef, et al.
PCM + CuO nanoparticles. The experiments showed that the maximum
generated power increased by 24.6% to 26.2% compared to the layout
without cooling system. Salem et al. [24] experimentally investigated
the performance of PV module cooling system using a compound en-
hancement technique of water and/or Al2O3/PCM mixture in straight
aluminum channels beneath the PV panel. Various nanoparticles mass
concentrations ratio in the range 0–1% and various cooling water mass
fluxes in the range 0–5.31 kg/s.m2 were tested. They illustrated that the
proposed compound technique achieved the highest PV performance.
Modjinou et al. [25] compared the performance of an integrated macro
encapsulated PCM- PV/T system with the performances of micro-
channel heat pipes (MCHP)-PV/T system and non-modified PV/T
system. The results showed that the combined average efficiency can
reach 36.71%, 35.53% and 31.78% for the encapsulated PCM, MCHP
and ordinary PV/T systems, respectively [25].
From the previous literature review and to the authors’ knowledge,
most of the previous studies used the PCM in direct contact with the
CPV for cooling and thermal regulation of the CPV system. This direct
contact technique has limited PV cooling capacity because of the lim-
ited contact space. Moreover, this technique is limited by the PCM
temperature degradation limit. So, PCM indirect cooling system for the
CPV was proposed in the present study. This indirect cooling system is
based on using a heat transfer medium between the PCM and the CPV to
transfer the dissipated heat from the CPV to the PCM. The advantages of
this proposed technique are (i) solving the limitation of the contact area
between the PCM and the CPV and (ii) solving the limitation of the PCM
melting degradation temperatures occurring in case of direct contact
technique. Moreover, the current design allows higher temperature
difference between the CPV and the heat transfer fluid which mean the
possibility to allow the system to work with high concentration ratio
and output power. In this technique, a closed loop of cooling water
integrated with a battery of PCMs enclosure is proposed for CPV
cooling. The stored heat in PCM enclosures can be utilized in water
heating system, desalination system or any other thermal applications.
Enhancing the effectiveness and the performance of the proposed
cooling system by (i) using different configurations of the PCM panels
in the batteries, (ii) increasing the HTF velocity and (iii) using a na-
nofluid of water and nanoparticles of CuO as HTF, was also in-
vestigated.
Fig. 1. Physical Model for a) Direct contact PCM and b) Indirect PCM-water loop integrated system.
3
Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065
2. Physical model
In the present study, the performance of low concentrated photo-
voltaic cell (CPV) with a concentration ratio (CR) of 10 is theoretically
investigated. The CPV is cooled by water flow in a channel in a direct
contact with the CPV back. The circulated water passes through a
battery/tank containing RT35HC PCM in aluminum panels. The PCM
panels regulate the water temperature before it goes back to the cooling
channel. The performance of the CPV with direct contact PCM-heat sink
is also investigated under the same operating and design conditions for
the sake of comparison and evaluation of the developed system. Fig. 1
shows a schematic diagram of the physical model of the proposed PCM-
cooling water loop integrated technique. As shown in the figure, the
model consists of CPV section, PCMs battery/tank system and circu-
lating pump and piping system. The CPV section consists of PV cell
integrated with a back cooling channel where water passes through the
channel to cool the cell. The PV panel consists of the cell covered from
both sides by EVA layers. The cell with the EVA layers is covered from
the top by glass layer and from the back by TPT layer. The TPT layer is
in direct contact with the water-cooling channel and the glass layer is
subjected to the sun radiation. It assumed that the CPV is mounted with
an inclination angle of 30° corresponding to the latitude angle of
Alexandria city, Egypt to maximize the received solar radiation. The
optical and thermophysical properties the PV module materials are
given in Table 1.
The PCM battery section consists of nine PCM panels enclosed in a
water tank. The PCM panel/plate has dimensions of 50 mm
(length) × 5 mm (thickness). The PCM panels are covered with an
aluminum shell of 0.5 mm thickness. This type of PCM panels is used
because of it is available and cheaper and has high corrosion resistance.
This type of PCM panels is treated by the manufacturer to solve the
expansion and contraction problem during the solidification and
melting of the PCM. The volume of the PCM inside all the panels is
0.0022 m3 per unit width with packing factor (ratio between the vo-
lume of PCM and the water in the storage tank) of 22.37%. The ther-
mophysical properties of the PCM and the aluminum shell are given in
Table 2.
The selection of the PCM type for a certain application depends on
many criteria. The most important selection criteria are the melting
temperature, the maximum working temperature to avoid degradation
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Table 1 where Ti represents the temperature; Cp, ρ, q and k are the specific heat,
Optical and thermophysical properties of the PV module materials [26]. density, interior heat generation per unit volume and thermal con-
Material α R τ ε ρ (kg/ κ (W/mK) ∁p (J/kg t (mm) ductivity of the layer, respectively and i is the layer number. The in-
m3) K) terior heat generation inside the PV per unit volume qi can be calculated
from [26] as:
Glass 0.04 0.04 0.92 0.85 2450 2 500 3.2
EVA 0.08 0.02 0.9 – 950 0.311 2090 0.5 (1 − ηsc )G(t) αi τi Ai
qi =
Cell 0.9 0.08 0.02 – 2330 130 677 0.2 Vi (2)
TPT 0.128 0.86 0.012 0.9 1200 0.15 1250 0.3
where G(t) is the solar concentrated irradiance in w/m , ƞsc is the 2

electrical efficiency of the silicon layer in the solar cell, αi , Vi, Ai, τi are
and the heat of fusion. The melting temperature of the PCM must be the absorptivity, volume, area in m2, and transmissivity of the layer i,
between the heat source and the desired application temperature. The respectively.
higher heat of fusion of PCM means higher thermal energy storage per The solar cell electric efficiency ηsc is calculated from [29,30]:
unit volume and higher reduction of the system size. For these reasons, ηsc = ηref (1 − βref (Tsc − Tref )) (3)
RT 35HC is selected for the present study as it has a higher heat of
fusion (240 kJ/kg) and its melting temperature is 35 °C [27] making it where ηref and βref are the reference solar cell efficiency and solar cell
suitable for heat transfer during the discharging process at the day time temperature coefficient at a reference temperature (Tref) of 25 °C, re-
(source temperature is about 40 °C) and during the charging process at spectively. The power productivity per unit width of the solar cell can
night where the cold water temperature is expected to be lower than be given by the following relation [31]:
30 °C.
Pele = ηsc G(t) H1, sc τg τE = ηref (1 − βref (Tsc − Tref ))G(t) H1, sc τg τE (4)
Different arrangements of the PCMs panels have been considered in
this study to investigate the effect of the PCM panels’ configurations on
the system performance. Fig. 2 shows a schematic of the different ar- 3.2. Phase change material
rangements that were investigated in this study. Four arrangements are
considered which are 3 × 3 in parallel arrangement (configuration A), The fluid flow and heat transfer through the phase change material
3 × 3 in staggered arrangement (configuration B), 2-3-4 in staggered are governed by the conservation equations. The buoyancy driven
arrangement (configuration C) and 4-3-2 in staggered arrangement convection conservation equations [32,33] can be written as follow:
(configuration D). In addition to these arrangements, the base case of Continuity equation:
the water tank without PCM panels has been also investigated. Pump
∂u ∂v
and piping system are used to circulate the fluid that between the CPV + =0
section and the PCM battery to transfers heat between them. The used ∂x ∂y (5)
HTF in the current study is pure water due to its availability, higher Momentum equations:
heat capacity and heat transfer coefficient, and its suitability for direct
use at different applications. Also, a nanofluid composed of pure water ∂u ∂u ∂u ∂P ∂ 2u ∂ 2u
ρ + ρu + ρv =− + μ ⎛ 2 + 2 ⎞ + Sx
⎜ ⎟

and CuO nanoparticles was used as heat transferred fluid (HTF) to in- ∂t ∂x ∂y ∂x ⎝ ∂x ∂y ⎠ (6)
vestigate the possibility of improving the system performance by using
nanofluid instead of pure water. ∂v ∂v ∂v ∂P ∂ 2v ∂ 2v
ρ + ρu + ρv =− + μ ⎛ 2 + 2 ⎞ + FB + Sy
⎜ ⎟

To utilize the stored heat in the PCM, a heat exchanger system could ∂t ∂x ∂y ∂y ⎝ ∂x ∂y ⎠ (7)
be coupled with the PCM storage tank to transfer the PCM stored heat
where ρ is the density in kg/m3 and u, v are the velocities of the liquid
to any thermal application as water heating as illustrated in Fig. 1. The
phase in × and y directions, respectively, P is the pressure, μ is the
PCMs panels are solidified during their charging process which occurs
dynamic viscosity and FB is a buoyancy force given by the Boussinesq
at night. The present study is presented during the charging process at
approximation [31] which is expressed by:
day time.
FB = −ρo (1 − β1 (T − To )) g (8)
3. Mathematical model where β1 is the thermal expansion coefficient; g is the acceleration of
gravity; ρo is the operating density, and To is the operating temperature.
3.1. Photovoltaic layers The operating density and temperature are taken to be ρo = ρl and
To = Tm, respectively.
The main mode of the heat transfer through the PV layers is un- The parameters Sx, and Sy in Eq. (7) are Darcy’s law damping terms
steady conduction which is expressed by the heat transfer diffusion (as source term) which are added to the momentum equations due to
equation [28]: the phase change effect. These terms depend on both the current liquid
fraction (λ) and the constant Amush [12] and can be defined as:
∂Ti (x , y ) ∂2T (x , y ) ∂2Ti (x , y ) ⎞
ρi ∁p, i = ki ⎛ i 2
⎜ + ⎟ + qi where i = 1, 2, ⋯, n
∂t ⎝ ∂x ∂y 2 ⎠ (1 − λ )2
Sx = Amush . u
(1) (λ3 + γ ) (9)

Table 2
PCM and aluminum thermo-physical properties.
Thermo-physical properties PCM RT35HC [27] aluminum [9]

Thermal conductivity (W/mK) (Solid/Liquid) 0.2/0.2 211/–

Density (kg/m3) (Solid/Liquid) 880 (at 25 °C)/770 (at 40 °C) 2675/–
Specific heat capacity (kJ/kg K) (Solid/Liquid) 2/2 0.903/–
Melting temperature (range) (°C) 34 – 36 (main peak: 35) –
Heat of fusion (kJ/kg) 240 –
Volumetric expansion, ΔV (1/kg) % 12 –

4
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Fig. 2. Illustration for storage tank of closed loop cooling system with different configurations.

(1 − λ )2 ⎧ ks , T < Tm
Sy = Amush . v ⎪ k s + kl
(λ3 + γ ) (10) kPCM = , Tm < T < Tm + ΔTm
⎨ 2
⎪ kl , T > Tm + ΔTm
where γ is a small number typically around 0.001 [34] which is in- ⎩ (18)
troduced to avoid the division by zero, and Amush is the mushy zone
The average solar cell temperature, stored thermal energy, and
constant which describes how steeply the velocity is reduced to zero
thermal efficiency of the CPV-PCM system over the period from the
when the material solidifies. Its value depends on the morphology of
initial time (ti) to the complete melting time (tm) are calculated based on
the medium and ranges between 104 and 108 kg/m3.s. In other words,
[33] as follow:
when the local liquid fraction equals zero, the material will be solid at
− 1 T = tm
such location and the source term becomes very large where the velo- Tsc, avg =
tm − ti
+ ∫T=t i
Tsc (t ) dt
(19)
city diminishes to zero. In the present study, Amush is assumed constant
for all simulations and it is set to be 106 kg/m3.s as recommended by − 1 T = tm
Hawwash et al. [34] which attains the best agreement between the Qth, avg − PCM =
tm − ti
+ ∫T=t i
Qth (t ) dt
(20)
predicted and both experimental and numerical data.
−
Energy equation for liquid phase [33,35] is as follow: Qth, avg − PCM ∗ mPCM
ηth, PCM =
∂H ∂H ∂H ∂ 2T ∂ 2T G (t ) ∗ Asc ∗ (tm − ti ) (21)
ρl + ρl u + ρl v = kl ⎛ 2 + ⎜
⎞ ⎟
∂t ∂x ∂y ⎝ ∂x ∂y 2 ⎠ (11)
3.3. Boundary and initial conditions
Energy equation for solid phase [33] is:
The convective heat transfer coefficient from the glass cover to the
∂H ∂ 2T ∂ 2T ⎞
ρs = ks ⎛ 2 +
⎜ ⎟ atmosphere (hconv,g-amb) due to the wind effect is estimated by the
∂t ⎝ ∂ x ∂y 2 ⎠ (12) following correlation [36]:
where H is the enthalpy of the material and it is computed from the hconv, al − amb = 5.7 + 3.8vw (22)
summation of the sensible enthalpy, h1, and the latent heat, ΔH:
where Vw is the wind speed which is considered 1.0 m/s through all
H = h1 + ΔH (13) models simulations. This equation is valid for our work because the
wind speed doesn’t pass the limit of 5 m/s [37]. The radiation heat
T transfer coefficients between the glass cover and the sky (hrad,g-sky) is
h1 = href + ∫T ref
Cp dT
(14) obtained by using an equation based on the assumption that the sky is a
black body with a temperature Tsky [37] as follow:
where href is the enthalpy at reference temperature Tref. The latent heat
term can be written in terms of the latent heat of the material L as: (Tg4 − Tsky
4
)
hrad, g − sky = σεg
(Tg − Tsky ) (23)
ΔH = λL (15)
The ɛg, and σ are the emissivity of the glass cover and the Stefan-
where ΔH varies from zero (solid) to L (liquid). Therefore, the liquid
Boltzmann constant, respectively. The sky temperature Tsky could be
fraction λ [33] can be defined as:
estimated by using the ambient temperature Tamb [37] as follows:
ΔH 1.5
⎧ L = 0, T < Tm Tsky = 0.0522Tamb (24)
⎪ ΔH T − Tsolidus
λ = L = Tliquidus − Tsolidus , Tm < T < Tm + ΔTm where Tamb is the ambient temperature and it is assumed 33 °C.
⎨
⎪ ΔH = 1, Adiabatic boundary conditions are applied for all outer walls of the
T > Tm + ΔTm (16)
⎩ L system except for the specified surfaces of the CPV.

where Tm is the melting temperature of the PCM, and ΔTm is the phase
transition range which is defined as the difference between the liquid
and solid temperatures as given below:
ΔTm = Tliquidus − Tsolidus
The PCM thermal conductivity depends on the phase change process
[33] as follows:
3.4. Properties of HTF
Pure Water is used as the HTF due to its availability and its suit-
(17) ability for direct use for different applications. Both the pure water and
the nanofluid which is composed of water and CuO nanoparticles of 4%
concentration ratio are used as HTF to further study the impact of using
nanofluid in the studied integrated cooling system. The thermophysical

5
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

properties of the pure water and nanofluids are required for the model ρnf (T )
to solve the model system of equations (equations (1) to (24)). The
= −741.654 + 21.928T − 9.059(10−2) T 2 + 1.661(10−4) T 3 − 1.174
thermo-physical properties of the water are expressed as functions of
the temperature (equations (25) to (28)). These equations have been (10−7) T 4 (35)
created by curve fitting using MATLAB software and the steam library
κnf (T ) = −1.603 + 1.341(10−2) T − 2.495(10−5) T 2 + 1.846(10−8) T 3
which contain the thermodynamic properties of the steam and water
based on the procedure of Jayakumar et al. [38] which are valid for the (36)
temperature range between 274.15 K and 372.15 K. These equations are
∁p, nf (T)
used as inputs to the ANSYS-Fluent software for the water properties.
= 23880.046 − 242.660T + 1.081T 2 − 2.151(10−3) T 3 + 1.611(10−6) T 4
ρw (T ) (37)
= −1043.853 + 22.84T − 9.437(10−2) T 2 + 1.730(10−4) T 3 − 1.223
μnf (T)
(10−7) T 4 (25)
= 9.873(10−1) − 1.140(10−2) T + 4.963(10−5) T 2 − 9.634(10−8)
κ w (T ) = −1.240 + 1.260(10−2) T − 2.738(10−5) T 2 + 1.980(10−8) T 3 T 3 + 7.028(10−11) T 4 (38)
(26)
It is validated by Casmito et al. [41] and Tiwari et al. [42] that the
∁p, w (T) nanoparticles of marginal volume concentration up to 5% in the base-
substance can be modeled as a single-phase fluid. So, the impact of the
= 31844.511 − 326.966T + 1.453T 2 − 2.881(10−3) T 3 + 2.154(10−6) T 4 thermodynamic properties of nanoparticles is considered and the na-
(27) nofluid is simulated by using developed equations as one phase fluid.

μ w (T) 4. Mathematical model solution

= 4.303(10−1) − 4.969(10−3) T + 2.163(10−5) T 2 − 4.199(10−8)
In the current investigation, two comprehensive models were de-
T 3 + 3.063(10−11) T 4 (28)
veloped and solved numerically by using the commercial software
The properties of nanofluid are used a function of the temperature ANSYS FLUENT 17.2. The first model is the integration between the
and the nanoparticle volume concentration. The density of the nano- thermal model for CPV layers, closed loop water, PCM melting-solidi-
fluid is determined by[39,40] fication and the thermofluid model of the PCM and HTF. The coupled
PRESTO and second-order upwind schemes were adapted to solve and
ρnf = ϕρnp + (1 − ϕ) ρw (29) model the indicated governing equations. The second developed model
is the direct contact between the thermal model for CPV layers and PCM
where ϕ is the particle volumetric concentration while ρnp andρw are the
densities of nanoparticles and water, respectively. The nanofluid visc- melting-solidification and the thermofluid model for the PCM. The
osity is calculated by [39] as follow: SIMPLE, PRESTO and second-order upwind schemes were used to solve
and model the governing equations at each time step. The model is
μnf = C1exp(C2ϕ) μ w (30) solved by using quadrilateral cells with a maximum mesh size of
0.2 mm. the number of inflation layers is set 30 with first layer height of
where C1 and C2 are constants and μ w is the viscosity of water which is 0.02 mm to achieve 20 layers within the laminar boundary layer to be
the base-fluid. The specific heat of the nanofluid is supposed to be a solved numerically precisely. Fig. 3a and b illustrate the mesh dis-
weighted average of the base-fluid and the nanoparticles and it is given tribution used in the numerical model on the PV layers and PCM sec-
by [39]. tions, respectively.
ϕρnp ∁p, np + (1 − ϕ) ρw ∁p, w
∁p, nf = 4.1. Mesh and time dependence study
ρnf (31)

where ∁p, np and ∁p, w are the specific heats of the nanoparticles and A mesh independent test was carried out for the integrated cooling
water, respectively. Then, the nanofluid thermal conductivity is defined system as shown in Fig. 4a. It is found that 1173517 grids are suitable
by [39]: after testing a grid number of 380742, 494282, 577781, 698407,

κnp + 2κ w − 2(κ w − κnp) ϕ kT Table 3

κnf = κ w + k1βϕρw ∁p, w f (T , ϕ )
κnp + 2κ w + (κ w − κnp) ϕ ρnp dnp Nanoparticles thermophysical properties and their operating parameters.
(32)
Parameter Value Unit
where k1 is the Brownian motion constant, dnp is the nanoparticle dia-
meter and κnp and κ w are the thermal conductivity of nanoparticle and ∁p, np, CuO 540 J·kg−1·K
water, respectively. While, β and f (T , ϕ) are an empirical correlation dnp, CuO 29 × 10−9 M
that considers the effect of the temperature and volumetric concentra- κnp, CuO 18 W·m−1·K−1
tion into account in Brownian motion. β and f (T , ϕ) are specified by k1 5 × 104 –
k 1.381 × 10−23 J·K−1
[39]:
ρnp, CuO 6510 kg·m−3
β = β1 (100ϕ) β2 (33) T0 298.15 K
c1 2.8217 × 10−2 –
c2 3.917 × 10−3 –
f (T , ϕ) = (c1ϕ + c2 ) T / T0 + (c3 ϕ + c4) (34)
c3 −3.0669 × 10−2 –
c4 −3.91123 × 10−3 –
whereβ1, β2 , c1, c2 , c3 and c4 are constants.
C1 (CuO) 0.9197 –
The nanoparticles properties are given in Table 3. C2 (CuO) 22.8539 –
The thermophysical properties of the nanofluid (Water + 4% CuO) β1 (CuO) 9.881 –
are obtained based on the previous equations [39] in polynomial β2 (CuO) −0.9446 –
functions as a function of the nanofluid temperature as follow:

6
H.A. Nasef, et al.
Fig. 3. Mesh distribution on the (a) PV layers and (b) PCM section.
876321, 1173517, 1457431, 2120040 and 3103207. A time step in-
dependent test was also carried out as stated in Fig. 4b to choose the
best time step for the physical model solution. A time step of 0.2 s is
used after testing 0.1, 0.2, 0.3 and 0.5 s to balance between the solution
accuracy and the computational cost. For the case of direct contact PCM
cooling system, the model is carried out with 101655 elements and
maximum grid size of 0.2 mm and a time step of 0.2 s based on a studied
model of the same configuration [43]. For both models, the deviation
was kept below 10−4 for continuity and momentum equations and
below 10−6 for energy equation.
4.2. Model validation
The validation of the numerical results is conducted by comparing
the present model results and the corresponding experimental and
numerical results of the literature. The direct contact PCM model is
validated with Kamkari et al. [44] results. This is carried out by com-
paring the temperature and the liquid fraction of PCM domain of the
present model results with the experimental data of Kamkari et al. [44]
where one wall under a constant temperature. Fig. 5 shows these
7
Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065
comparisons for the variation of liquid fraction percentage and the
temperatures at different locations in the enclosure with time. Also, the
temperatures at different places in the enclosure at different time steps,
are considered. Fig. 5 shows that the comparison between the present
model results and Kamkari et al. [44] demonstrates a good agreement
between the current predicted results and the experiments. The differ-
ence for the melting rate and PCM temperatures between the two re-
sults can be attributed to the heat loss through the thermal insulation of
the outer surface of the PCM layer at the experiment work of Kamkari
et al. [44] which was considered completely insulated in the present
model.
The second model of the present study (model of the heat transfer
between the PCM and the PV) is validated by comparing the present
model results with the results of Said and Hassan [45,46]. It is carried
out by comparing the predicted outlet temperature of HTF from PCM-
cooled duct with the experimental results of Said and Hassan [45,46].
To conduct this comparison, the model was run under the same con-
ditions as Said and Hassan [45,46]. As shown in Fig. 6, the comparison
shows a good agreement between the present model and experiments.
Moreover, the model of melting process of RT35HC PCM is
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Fig. 4. Mesh and time step independent tests.

validated by the experimental results of Emam et al. [47]. His physical

model is a thermally insulated rectangle enclosure of dimensions
100 mm height and 50 mm width and it is filled with RT35HC. The
enclosure is subjected at its left side by constant heat flux of 3750 W/
m2. Fig. 7 shows the comparison of the present model results and the
experimental results of Emam et al. [47] for the variation of the PCM
liquid fraction with time. The comparison illustrates that the melting
process of the present model has the same trend of the experimental
results with maximum deviation between the two results of about 4%
due to the numerical solution accuracy. From the previous validation
cases, it can be stated that the present model solves well the used
mathematical equations in the present study.

5. Results and discussions

The CPV and the cooling systems are assumed at an initial tem-
perature Tin = 33 °C and the PCM is in the solid state. The top glass
surface of CPV is considered under free convection boundary conditions
with h = 9.89 W/m2 K due to a wind speed of 1 m/s and Tamb = 33 °C.
The CPV performance is studied at 30° an inclination angle and the
glass surface is considered at a constant concentration ratio of CR = 10
Fig. 5. Direct contact PCM model validation with Kamkari et al. [44]
suns with solar intensity of 1000 W/m2. The model was studied at
different PCM batteries arrangements, HTF velocities and types (pure
water, and nanofluids). The model of PCM-CPV direct contact system

8
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

graphs of all cases show the increase of the average cell temperature
with time. Fig. 8a shows that for all PCM panels’ arrangements in the
water tank the silicon layer temperature sharply increases until it

240

200

Average Silicon Temperature (oC)

160

120
90
80
70
Config. A
60
Config. B
50 Config. C
Config. D
40 Water
Direct Contact PCM
30
20
Fig. 6. Variation of the outlet HTF temperature with time of the present model 0 10 20 30 40
and Said and Hassan [45,46]. Time (Minutes)
(a) Average silicon temperature.
300
250
Maximum Temperature of Silicon layer(oC) 200
150
100
90

80

70

60 Config. A
Config. B
Config. C
50 Config. D
Water
40 Direct Contact PCM

30
0 10 20 30 40
Time (Minutes)
(b) Maximum local solar cell temperature.
Solar Cell Temperature Uniformity (Tmax - Tmin) (oC)

120
Fig. 7. Evolution of the liquid fraction with time of the present model results
and experimental results of Emam et al. [47] during melting of RT35HC PCM. 100
80
was also studied at the same conditions. The study was carried out to
60
investigate and compare the performance of the proposed systems in-
cluding silicon layer and glass surface local temperatures, PV power 40
output, efficiency of the CPV and the PCM melting process history by 20
tracing the liquid fraction of each PCM enclosure. In this section, the 10
simulation results of the thermal behavior and performance of the
8
proposed systems are discussed, evaluated and compared. Moreover,
Config. A
the effects of the PCM panels’ arrangements, HTF velocity and adding 6
Config. B
nanoparticles to the HTF on the thermal behavior and performance of Config. C
4 Config. D
the systems are also presented, analyzed, discussed and evaluated.
Water
2 Direct Contact PCM

5.1. Effect of integrating PCM with the cooling water system 0

0 10 20 30 40
Time (Minutes)
Fig. 8 shows the variations of the average silicon temperature,
maximum local solar cell temperature and solar cell temperature uni- (c) Solar cell temperature uniformity
formity with time. Fig. 8a shows the average temperatures of the silicon
layer along the simulation time in case of direct contact PCM system Fig. 8. Variation of the average silicon temperature, maximum local solar cell
and PCM panels integrated with the cooling water. As expected, the temperature and Solar cell temperature uniformity with time.

9
H.A. Nasef, et al.
reaches 70 °C after three minutes. After this period, the temperature of
the cell remains approximately constant for 4 min (until the 7 min),
then the temperature starts to slightly increase to reaches 85 °C at the
end of the simulation time (about 35 min) which is within the range of
the working temperature of the PCM. The period of constant tem-
perature (between 3 min and 7 min) may be due to the balance between
the heat dissipated from the CPV to the cooling water and the heat
absorbed from the cooling water by the PCM panels. After this period,
the inlet water temperature to the CPV water channel starts to increase
with time causing the increase of the average temperature of the solar
cell layer with time. Fig. 8a also shows that, in case of closed loop of
water without PCM panels in the water tank, the temperature of the
solar cell is always higher than the cases of using PCM panels. This can
be attributed to the continuous reduction of the water temperature
caused by the heat absorbed by the PCM.
Fig. 8a also shows that the temperature of the silicon layer in case of
direct contact PCM sharply increases to 90 °C within the first 3 min, and
then gradually increases to reach 260 °C at the end of the simulation
time which is highly greater than the allowable working temperature of
the solar cell. The gradual increase of the silicon temperature after the
first three minutes can be attributed to the start of the PCM melting
which leads to the damping of the PV temperature rise. Thus, it can be
concluded that, using closed circuit of water flow integrated with PCM
in the water storage tank has better thermal performance compared
with the cases of water flow without PCM and direct contact PCM.
Fig. 8a also shows that the arrangements of the PCM panels in the
storage tank haven’t sensible effect on the thermal performance of the
system where the cell temperature is approximately the same in all
arrangements. This indicates that the water temperature at the outlet of
the PCM tank is not affected by the PCM panels’ configurations due to
the forced convection flow and high heat capacity of the water. The
effect may be appearing in the case of airflow with very low air velo-
city.
Fig. 8b shows the variation of the local maximum temperature of
the silicon layer with time during the simulation period. It is worth to
mention that the location of the point of the maximum temperature on
the cell surface may vary from time to time. The trend of the maximum
temperature with time is approximately the same as the trend of the
average solar cell temperature shown in Fig. 8a. Fig. 8b shows that the
maximum temperature of the cell in case PCM direct contact cooling
system increases with time with a maximum value of 275 °C at the end
of simulation time. While in case of water system and water-PCM in-
tegrated system, the maximum temperature of the cell sharply increases
with time in the first 2 min until it reaches 75 °C and remains constant
for five minutes, and then, it gradually increases to reach 88 °C and
75 °C in case of water system and water-PCM integrated systems, re-
spectively. It is worth to mention that the maximum temperatures in
case of water and water-PCM integrated system are within the working
temperatures of the PV and PCM while the maximum temperature of
the direct contact-PCM is not within those working temperatures.
Fig. 8c shows the uniformity of the temperature (expressed by the
difference between the local maximum and minimum temperatures on
the cell surface) over the surface of the solar cell. The figure shows that
for closed loop water systems, the solar cell temperature uniformity
reaches a peak value of 9 °C at 3 min and then slightly decreases to
reach a value of 8 °C at the end of the simulation time. The temperature
uniformity of the direct contact PCM system reaches to a peak value of
123 °C at 17th minute then it gradually decreases to reach a value of
70 °C at the end of the simulation time. The high variation of the cell
temperature in case of the direct contact system may attributed to that
some local points of the PCM are in the solid phase and other points are
in the melting phase or the liquid phase.
Fig. 9 shows the variations of the percentage of the liquid fraction of
the PCM with time for the water, water–PCM integrated and direct
contact PCM cooling systems. It is obvious that all graphs have an in-
crease of the liquid fraction with time. The complete melting of the
10
Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065
PCM in the water-PCM integrated systems (A, B, C, and D) is achieved
in the 21st minute. While, direct contact PCM system finishes 80% of
the melting process on the first 10 min, and then it continues gradually
melting until complete melting at the end of the simulation time. The
figure also shows that for water–PCM integrated system (configurations
A, B, C, and D), the melting process starts after two minutes which
covers the sensible heating period of the PCM.
Fig. 10 shows the variation of the local solar cell and glass layer
temperatures along the length of the inclined CPV (y-direction) after
30 min. Fig. 10a and 10b show the increase of the local cell and the
glass layer temperatures along the length of the CPV. This can be at-
tributed to the increase of the water temperature along the length of the
CPV as it passes in the water channel. The figures also show that the
temperature levels in case of integrating PCM with the water is lower
than the cases of water without PCM and direct contact PCM. Com-
paring the cell temperature in Fig. 10a with the glass temperature in
Fig. 10b reveals that the glass temperature is always lower than the cell
temperature by about 1–4 °C. For example, for water with PCM (all
configurations) and for water without PCM, the temperature along the
length of the solar cell increases gradually from 78 °C to 86 °C and from
81 °C to 89 °C, respectively. However, the temperature of the cell and
the glass in case of direct contact PCM increases gradually from 190 °C
to 270 °C and from 185 °C to 255 °C, respectively. The increase of the
cell temperature along the length of the cell can be attributed to the
buoyancy effect of the convection heat transfer.
Fig. 11 illustrates the variation of the solar cell efficiency with time
during the simulation period. For the closed loop water systems, the
efficiency sharply decreases with time to reach 12% at the first three
minutes, and then stays constant until the 7th minute. After that, the
efficiency slightly decreases with time until it reaches 11% at the end of
simulation time. This trend can be attributed to the increase of the solar
cell temperature with time during the simulation period with the trend
shown in Fig. 8a. The figure also shows that the solar cell efficiency in
case of using water with PCM panels is always higher than that the case
of using water only. For example, at the twentieth min, the efficiency of
the solar cell in case of using PCM panels is higher than that of using
water without PCM by about 5%. On the other hand, Fig. 11 also shows
that the solar cell efficiency for the case of direct contact PCM sharply
decreases with time along the entire simulation time due to the sharply
increase of temperature with time as shown in Fig. 8a. Fig. 11 also
shows a decrease in the efficiency after the third minute because of the
starting of the PCM melting causing a damping of the cell temperature.
Fig. 12 shows the variation of the net power delivered by the CPV
Fig. 9. Variation of the overall liquid fraction with time.
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

0.16

0.14

0.12

Efficiency of Solar Cell

0.1 Config. A
Config. B
Config. C
0.08
Config. D
Water
0.06 Direct Contact PCM

0.04

0.02

0
0 10 20 30 40
Time (Minutes)
Fig. 11. Variation of the solar cell efficiency with time.

200

180
Net Power Per Unit Width (W/m)

160

140

120 Config. A
Config. B
100 Config. C
Config. D
80 Water
Direct Contact PCM

60

40

20

Fig. 10. Variation of the local temperature of the PV layers at 30 min.
with time for the water, integrated water-PCM, and PCM direct contact
cooling systems. In cases of water and water-PCM cooling systems, the
net power increases to reach a constant value of 150 W/m after 2 min
and stays at this value to the 7th minute, and then marginally decreases
to reach 138 W/m at the end of the simulation time. On the other hand,
in case of direct contact PCM system the power sharply decreases with
time to reach a value of 130 W/m at the 3rd minute, and then it slightly
decreases till reaching theoretically to zero value at the end of the si-
mulation time. It is considered that the solar cell is not functional after
the first 10 min because of exceeding the allowable working tempera-
ture. The decrease of the power with this transient trend can be at-
tributed to the increase of the solar cell temperature with time as shown
in Fig. 8a.
5.2. Effects of HTF velocity and using nanofluid
In this section, the effects of the HTF velocity and adding nano-
particles to the HTF on the temperature levels and the performance
(efficiency and net output power) of the CPV cells are investigated.
0
0 10 20 30 40
Time (Minutes)
Fig. 12. Variation of the net power per unit width with time.
Fig. 13 represents the distribution of the temperature contours of the
five layers of the solar cell at three different times for different PCM
panels’ arrangements, HTF velocities of 0.01 and 0.02 m/s and pure
water and nanofluid. The temperature contours of direct contact-PCM
are also shown in this figure. It is clear that the temperature contours
for all closed loop cooling systems have similar profiles except the
cooling system without PCM enclosure which shows higher tempera-
ture levels than other systems. The figure also shows that the CPV cell
back temperature is always lower than the CPV front surface tem-
perature due to using backward cooling. The figure also shows that the
temperature level in case of the PCM direct contact system is very high
and excesses the allowable working temperature of the PV cell.
Fig. 14 shows the effects of the HTF velocity and using nanofluid on
the solar cell average temperature in case of PCM panels of arrange-
ment as an example. The figure shows that the temperatures of the
different layers of the CPV cells at different HTF velocities and types are
similar to the trends discussed previously in Fig. 8a. It is clear that the
solar cell average temperature increases with time for all cases of HTF

11
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

Cooling loop cooling system

10 minutes 20 minutes 30 minutes configuration HTF average velocity

in PV cooling direct

A-4%CuO
V=0.02 m/s
A

A-4%CuO

B
V=0.01 m/s

water

Direct contact cooling system

Fig. 13. Photovoltaics temperature contours for different configurations and circulation velocities.

90

80
Average Silicon Temperature (oC)

70

60

50

Config. A V=0.01 m/s

40 Config. A V=0.01 m/s 4%CuO
Config. A V=0.02 m/s
Config. A V= 0.02 m/s 4%CuO

30
0 10 20 30 40
Time (Minutes)
Fig. 14. Evolution of the average silicon temperature with and without nano-
Fig. 15. Effects of HTF velocity and using nanofluid on the solar cell efficiency.
fluid at different velocities with time.

12
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

180 of the cell layers where at any HTF velocity, the cell temperature in case
Config. A V=0.01 m/s of nanofluid is always slightly lower than that of pure water case. This
175 Config. A V=0.01 m/s 4%CuO can be attributed to the higher thermal conductivity of the nanofluid
Config. A V=0.02 m/s
Net Power Per Unit Width (W/m)

170 Config. A V=0.02 m/s 4%CuO compared to the thermal conductivity of pure water as illustrated in
Eqs. 26–36.
165 Fig. 15 shows the effects of the HTF velocity and using nanofluid on
the efficiency of the solar cell. As shown in the figure for all HTF ve-
160
locities, the efficiency decrease with time where the efficiency drops
155 sharply to 12% in the first 2 min and stays constant at this value for
5 min, then it gradually decreases to reach about11% at the end of the
150 simulation time. The figure also shows that before the 17th minute, the
efficiency in case of 0.02 m/s velocity is higher than that of case
145
0.01 m/s and the opposite occurs after the 17th minute where the ef-
140 ficiency of 0.01 m/s case becomes higher than that of 0.02 m/s. This
can be attributed to the cell temperature levels of the two velocities
135 before and after the 17th minute as shown in Fig. 14. Fig. 15 also shows
that using nanofluid instead of pure water slightly improves the effi-
130
0 10 20 30 40 ciency of the solar cell and this can be attributed to the high heat
Time (Minutes) transfer characteristics of the nanofluid which leads to a reduction in
the cell temperature.
Fig. 16. Variation of the net and friction power per unit width with time at
Fig. 16 shows the variation of the PV output power per with time for
different HTF velocities and for nanofluids.
the different HTF velocities in cases of using pure water and nanofluid.
As shown in the figure, for all cases the power decreases with time
1 along the entire simulation time. The figure shows that the output
power falls suddenly to be around 150 W/m in the first two minutes
0.9
then it gradually decreases 136 and 135 W/m for 0.01 and 0.02 m/s
0.8 HTF velocities, respectively. A five minutes period of constant power is
Overall Liquid Fraction (%)

0.7
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
Config. A V=0.01 m/s
0.2 Config. A V=0.01 m/s 4% CuO
Config. A V=0.02 m/s
0.1 Config. A V=0.02 m/s 4% CuO
0
0 10 20 30
Time (Minutes)
Fig. 17. Variation of overall Liquid Fraction with time at different velocities.
velocities and nanofluid and pure water. For example, at a HTF velocity
of 0.01 m/s, the average solar cell temperature increases sharply to
70 °C on the first 2 min and stays at this value without variations for
another 5 min, then increases slightly to reach 85 °C at the end of the
simulation time. At HTF velocity of 0.02 m/s, the cell temperature also
sharply increases to 67 °C in the first 2nd minute and then slightly in-
creases to reach 87 °C at the end of the simulation time without noticing
of the constant temperature period after the 2nd minute. The dis-
appearance of the constant temperature in the interval 2–7 min in case
of high HTF velocities can be attributed to the high heat transfer
coefficient and high water flow rate which rapidly increase the fluid
temperature at the inlet of the solar cell water channel. Comparing the
temperatures histories at 0.01 and 0.02 m/s, it is noticed in the first
17th minutes, the solar cell average temperature in case of 0.02 m/s is
lower than that of case 0.01 m/s because of the higher convection heat
transfer due to the high HTF velocity. However, after the 17th minute,
the cell temperature in case of 0.02 m/s becomes higher than that of
0.01 m/s case due to the high temperature level of the cell in case of
0.02 m/s at this time intervals. This means that increasing the HTF
velocity has a positive impact on the cell temperature before the 17th
minute and has a negative impact after this time. Fig. 14 also shows that
adding nanoparticles to the pure water enhances the temperature levels
noticed after the 2nd minute at 0.01 m/s before it the slightly decrease
with time. The figure also shows that before the 17th minute, the net
output power in case of 0.02 m/s is higher than that of 0.01 m/s and the
opposite is true after the 17 min. This trend can be attributed to the
trend of the cell temperature at the different velocities as shown in
Fig. 14. Fig. 16 also shows that using nanofluid slightly increases the
output net power due to the enhancement of the cell temperature as
illustrated in Fig. 14.
Fig. 17 shows the variation of the liquid fraction percentage during
the simulation period for the different HTF velocities in cases of using
pure water and nanofluid. The figure shows the increase of the liquid
fraction percentage with time for all cases of HTF velocities and types.
40 The liquid fraction percentage is zero in the first two minutes, then it
gradually increases to reach 100% at 18 and 21 min for 0.02 and
0.01 m/s HTF velocities, respectively, then it stays constant until the
end of the simulation time. The figure also shows that after the 7th
minute, the liquid fraction in case of 0.02 m/s is always higher than that
of 0.01 m/s. The figure also shows that the complete melting in case of
0.02 m/s occurs before the case of 0.01 m/s due to the higher heat
transfer coefficient and higher HTF mass flow rate which accelerate the
melting process.
6. Conclusions
An integrative passive and active cooling system using PCM and
cooling water has been developed for thermal regulation of CPV system.
Aluminum panels of PCM are remotely located from the CPV system
and closed loop of water cooling system is used to transfer the heat from
the CPV to the PCM. A Two-dimensional mathematical model has been
developed to simulate the proposed system including the CPV layers,
the PCM section and the cooling water loop. The results showed that the
proposed passive-active integration system achieves a reduction in the
average temperature of the CPV by about 60%, and an enhancement in
the CPV system efficiency by about 224% after 20 min of running the
system. Moreover, this system decreases the PCM melting time by about
33% and produces more output power compared to the individual
conventional heat sink PCM and water-cooling system. At very low
velocity of the HTF (0.01 m/s) and a concentration ratio (CR) of 10, the
temperature of the CPV and the PCM modules are kept below the limits

13
H.A. Nasef, et al.
of the PV failure and the PCM degradation temperatures. Further in-
vestigations have been performed to study the impact of the different
arrangements of the PCM plates in the water tank, velocity of the HTF
and using nanofluid as HTF instead of pure water on the performance of
the system. The PCMs panels arrangements in the water tank have
negligible effect on the system performance. Increasing the velocity of
the HTF from 0.01 m/s to 0.02 m/s enhances the system performance in
the initial period of the discharging process then it has an adverse effect
on the system performance. Using nanofluid as HTF enhances the
overall performance of the system where it increases the CPV output
power by 2.5% and decreases the PCM melting time by 12%. Future
works of experimental investigations of the performance of the devel-
oped system using different PCM materials and nanoparticles types and
percentages are proposed.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influ-
ence the work reported in this paper.
References
[1] Royne A, Dey CJ, Mills DR. Cooling of photovoltaic cells under concentrated illu-
mination: a critical review. Sol Energy Mater Sol Cells 2005;86:451–83. https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.solmat.2004.09.003.
[2] Soliman AMA, Hassan H, Ahmed M, Ookawara S. A 3d model of the effect of using
heat spreader on the performance of photovoltaic panel (PV). Math Comput Simul
2018. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matcom.2018.05.011.
[3] Nada SA. Natural convection heat transfer in horizontal and vertical closed narrow
enclosures with heated rectangular finned base plate. Int J Heat Mass Transfer 2007.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2006.07.010.
[4] Hussein HMS, El-Ghetany HH, Nada SA. Performance of wickless heat pipe flat plate
solar collectors having different pipes cross sections geometries and filling ratios.
Energy Convers Manage 2006. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2005.08.009.
[5] Shokouhmand H, Kamkari B. Experimental investigation on melting heat transfer
characteristics of lauric acid in a rectangular thermal storage unit. Exp Therm Fluid
Sci 2013;50:201–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.expthermflusci.2013.06.010.
[6] Alshaer WG, Nada SA, Rady MA, Del Barrio Elena Palomo. Thermal management of
electronic devices using carbon foam and PCM/nano-composite. Int J Therm Sci
2015;89:79–86. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijthermalsci.2014.10.012.
[7] Nada SA, El-Nagar DH, Hussein HMS. Improving the thermal regulation and effi-
ciency enhancement of PCM-Integrated PV modules using nano particles. Energy
Convers Manage 2018;166:735–43.
[8] Nada SA, El-Nagar DH. Possibility of using PCMs in temperature control and per-
formance enhancements of free stand and building integrated PV modules. Int
Renewable Energy 2018;127:630–41. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2018.05.
010.
[9] Kamkari B, Groulx D. Experimental investigation of melting behaviour of phase
change material in finned rectangular enclosures under different inclination angles.
2018. doi: 10.1016/j.expthermflusci.2018.04.007.
[10] Karami R, Kamkari B. Investigation of the effect of inclination angle on the melting
enhancement of phase change material in finned latent heat thermal storage units.
Appl Therm Eng 2019;146:45–60. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2018.
09.105.
[11] Huang MJ, Eames PC, Norton B. Phase change materials for limiting temperature
rise in building integrated photovoltaics. Sol Energy 2006;80:1121–30. https://doi.
org/10.1016/j.solener.2005.10.006.
[12] Emam M, Ookawara S, Ahmed M, Ookawara S, Ahmed M. Performance study and
analysis of an inclined concentrated photovoltaic-phase change material system. Sol
Energy 2017;150:229–45. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2017.04.050.
[13] Huzayyin AS, Nada SA, Rady MA, Faris A. Cooling an array of multiple heat sources
by a row of slot air jets. Int J Heat Mass Transf 2006;49(15–16):2597–609. https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2005.10.048.
[14] Nada SA, El-Ghetany HH, Hussein HMS. Performance of a two-phase closed ther-
mosyphon solar collector with a shell and tube heat exchanger. Appl Thermal Eng
2004;24(13):1959–68. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2003.12.015.
[15] Liu L, Zhu L, Wang Y, Huang Q, Sun Y, Yin Z. Heat dissipation performance of
silicon solar cells by direct dielectric liquid immersion under intensified illumina-
tions. Sol Energy 2011;85:922–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2011.02.007.
[16] Emam M, Ahmed M. Performance analysis of a new concentrator photovoltaic
system integrated with phase change material and water jacket. Sol Energy
2018;173:1158–72. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2018.08.069.
[17] Al-waeli AHA, Sopian K, Chaichan MT, Kazem HA, Ibrahim A, Mat S, et al.
Evaluation of the nano fluid and nano-PCM based photovoltaic thermal (PVT)
system : an experimental study 2017;151:693–708. doi: 10.1016/j.enconman.2017.
09.032.
[18] Gaur A, Ménézo C, Giroux-Julien S. Numerical studies on thermal and electrical
performance of a fully wetted absorber PVT collector with PCM as a storage
14
Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065
medium. Renew Energy 2017;109:168–87. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2017.
01.062.
[19] Preet S, Bhushan B, Mahajan T. Experimental investigation of water based photo-
voltaic/thermal (PV/T) system with and without phase change material (PCM). Sol
Energy 2017;155:1104–20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2017.07.040.
[20] Yang X, Sun L, Yuan Y, Zhao X, Cao X. Experimental investigation on performance
comparison of PV/T-PCM system and PV/T system. Renew Energy 2017. https://
doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2017.11.094.
[21] Su Y, Zhang Y, Shu L. Experimental study of using phase change material cooling in
a solar tracking concentrated photovoltaic-thermal system. Sol Energy
2018;159:777–85. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2017.11.045.
[22] Yang X, Sun L, Yuan Y, Zhao X, Cao X. Experimental investigation on performance
comparison of PV/T-PCM system and PV/T system. Renew Energy 2018;119:152–9.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2017.11.094.
[23] Siahkamari L, Rahimi M, Azimi N, Banibayat M. Experimental investigation on
using a novel phase change material (PCM) in micro structure photovoltaic cooling
system. Int Commun Heat Mass Transf 2019;100:60–6. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
icheatmasstransfer.2018.12.020.
[24] Salem MR, Elsayed MM, Abd-Elaziz AA, Elshazly KM. Performance enhancement of
the photovoltaic cells using Al2O3/PCM mixture and/or water cooling-techniques.
Renew Energy 2019;138:876–90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2019.02.032.
[25] Modjinou M, Ji J, Yuan W, Zhou F, Holliday S, Waqas A, et al. Performance com-
parison of encapsulated PCM PV/T, microchannel heat pipe PV/T and conventional
PV/T systems. Energy 2019;166:1249–66. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2018.
10.007.
[26] Zhou J, Yi Q, Wang Y, Ye Z. Temperature distribution of photovoltaic module based
on finite element simulation. Sol Energy 2015;111:97–103. https://doi.org/10.
1016/j.solener.2014.10.040.
[27] Rubitherm 2015.
[28] Radwan A, Ahmed M. The influence of microchannel heat sink configurations on
the performance of low concentrator photovoltaic systems. Appl Energy
2017;206:594–611. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2017.08.202.
[29] Xu Z, Kleinstreuer C. Concentration photovoltaic-thermal energy co-generation
system using nanofluids for cooling and heating. Energy Convers Manage
2014;87:504–12. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2014.07.047.
[30] Soliman AMA, Hassan H. 3D study on the performance of cooling technique com-
posed of heat spreader and microchannels for cooling the solar cells. Energy
Convers Manage 2018;170:1–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2018.05.
075.
[31] Kant K, Shukla A, Sharma A, Biwole PH. Heat transfer studies of photovoltaic panel
coupled with phase change material. Sol Energy 2016;140:151–61. https://doi.org/
10.1016/j.solener.2016.11.006.
[32] Brent AD, Voller VR, Reid KJ. Enthalpy-porosity technique for modeling convec-
tion-diffusion phase change: application to the melting of a pure metal. Numer Heat
Transf 1988;13:297–318. https://doi.org/10.1080/10407788808913615.
[33] Hawwash AA, Abdel-Rahman AK, Ookawara S, Nada SA. Experimental study of
alumina nanofluids effects on thermal performance efficiency of flat plate solar
collectors. GSTF J Eng Technol 2016;4(1). https://doi.org/10.5176/2251-3701_4.1.
183.
[34] Hawwash AA, Rahman AKA, Nada SA, Ookawar S. Numerical investigation and
experimental verification of performance enhancement of flat plate solar collector
using nanofluids. Appl Thermal Eng 2018;130:363–1347. https://doi.org/10.1016/
j.applthermaleng.2017.11.027.
[35] Soliman AMA, Hassan H. Effect of heat spreader size, microchannel con figuration
and nanoparticles on the performance of PV-heat spreader-microchannels system.
Sol Energy 2019;182:286–97. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2019.02.059.
[36] Ahmed M, Radwan A. Performance evaluation of new modified low-concentrator
polycrystalline silicon photovoltaic/thermal systems. Energy Convers Manage
2017;149:593–607. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2017.07.057.
[37] Rejeb O, Dhaou H, Jemni A. A numerical investigation of a photovoltaic thermal
(PV/T) collector. Renew Energy 2015;77:43–50. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.
2014.12.012.
[38] Jayakumar JS, Mahajani SM, Mandal JC, Vijayan PK, Bhoi R. Experimental and CFD
estimation of heat transfer in helically coiled heat exchangers. Chem Eng Res Des
2008;86:221–32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cherd.2007.10.021.
[39] Vajjha RS, Das DK, Namburu PK. Numerical study of fluid dynamic and heat
transfer performance of Al2O3 and CuO nanofluids in the flat tubes of a radiator. Int
J Heat Fluid Flow 2010;31:613–21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatfluidflow.
2010.02.016.
[40] Sarit K. Das, Stephen U. S. Choi, Wenhua Yu TP. Nanofluids: Science and
Technology. 2007.
[41] Sasmito AP, Kurnia JC, Mujumdar AS. Numerical evaluation of laminar heat
transfer enhancement in nanofluid flow in coiled square tubes. Nanoscale Res Lett
2011;6:1–14. https://doi.org/10.1186/1556-276X-6-376.
[42] Tiwari AK, Ghosh P, Sarkar J, Dahiya H, Parekh J. Numerical investigation of heat
transfer and fluid flow in plate heat exchanger using nanofluids. Int J Therm Sci
2014;85:93–103. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijthermalsci.2014.06.015.
[43] Rabie R, Emam M, Ookawara S, Ahmed M. Thermal management of concentrator
photovoltaic systems using new configurations of phase change material heat sinks.
Sol Energy 2019;183:632–52. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2019.03.061.
[44] Kamkari B, Shokouhmand H. Experimental investigation of phase change material
melting in rectangular enclosures with horizontal partial fins. Int J Heat Mass
Transf 2014;78:839–51. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2014.07.
056.
[45] Said MA, Hassan H. Parametric study on the effect of using cold thermal storage
energy of phase change material on the performance of air-conditioning unit. Appl
H.A. Nasef, et al. Energy Conversion and Management 199 (2019) 112065

[47] Emam M, Ookawara S, Ahmed M. Thermal management of electronic devices and

Energy 2018;230:1380–402. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2018.09.048.
[46] Said MA, Hassan H. Effect of using nanoparticles on the performance of thermal
energy storage of phase change material coupled with air-conditioning unit. Energy
Convers Manage 2018;171:903–16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2018.06.
051.
concentrator photovoltaic systems using phase change material heat sinks:
Experimental investigations. Renew Energy 2019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
renene.2019.03.151.

15