Experimental Investigation of Soiling Losses and a Novel Cost-Effective Cleaning System for Conventional PV Modules /

Abstract

Dust accumulation significantly reduces the efficiency of a photovoltaic (PV) module, and the unavailability of an economical and efficient cleaning solution is the persistent problem. Therefore, the focus of this is to investigate the effect of dust on PV performance and proposes a novel cleaning system for the removal of dust from the front surface of PV modules. The outdoor experiment is conducted on the monocrystalline (mono-PV) and polycrystalline (poly-PV) PV modules. Each set contains two PV modules (mono-PV and poly-PV), one set is cleaned every day and the other set left uncleaned throughout the period of the experiment. The cleaning of the PV module is performed using pressurized water, sprayed through a flat-fan nozzle to clean the front surface. The waste-water is collected, filtered and directed back to the storage tank. The cleaning system has a water recovering capacity of 55 % and a water requirement of 1.8 L per m² of PV area. It has been analyzed that the output power of the mono-PV module and poly-PV module has decreased by 16.16 % and 11.54 %, respectively after one month with the dust deposition density of 4.6 g/m². The cleaning process improves the efficiency of the PV module by 98 % in 35 seconds of operation with a water flow rate of 1.74 L/min. The economic analysis results indicate that the cost of the cleaning system for mono-PV (40 watts) and poly-PV (40 watts) modules are 0.037 USD/month, which is greater than the cost of energy losses 0.005 USD/month It has been evaluated that the proposed cleaning system is cost-effective for commercial size PV modules having a length of around 2 m. Furthermore, the mono-PV module (400-watts) and poly-PV module (355-watts) should be cleaned within 85 days of dust accumulation for optimum energy usage.