Preface

The word energy has been continuously in the news since 1973 due to the
shortages of oil in many parts of the world and the price of this commodity
has increased steeply. It is now clear that the fossil-fuel era of non-renewable
resources is gradually coming to an end. The renewable sources of energy
derived from the Sun are one of the promising options. Solar energy can be
used both directly and indirectly. It can be used directly in a variety of ther-
mal applications like heating air or water, drying, distillation and space heat-
ing etc. A second way in which solar energy can be used directly is through
the photovoltaic eect, in which it is converted to electrical energy. Indir-
ectly, the Sun causes winds to blow, plants to grow, rain to fall and tempera-
ture dierences to occur from the surface to the bottom of the oceans.
Useful energy can be obtained for commercial and non-commercial purposes
through all these renewable sources.
In this book, we are primarily concerned with the collection and storage of
solar energy for thermal and electrical applications. The purpose of writing this
book is to provide a suitable text for teaching the subject to engineering and
science students, as well as a reference book for scientists and professionals.
The material is based on the authors research experience and his experience of
teaching the subject for a number of years to postgraduate and undergraduate
engineering students. We assume that the reader of this book has a basic
background in physics, mathematics, thermodynamics, heat transfer, electrical
and electronics. This book is quantitative and applications-oriented, with an
emphasis on resource estimation, system sizing and economic evaluation.
The objective of the book is to provide a platform to disseminate the
knowledge regarding fundamentals of photovoltaic thermal systems, namely:

 fundamentals of solar energy and basic heat transfer;

 characteristics of solar cells and their materials;
 use of photovoltaic modules and arrays in solar systems;

RSC Energy Series No. 2

Fundamentals of Photovoltaic Modules and Their Applications
By G. N. Tiwari and Swapnil Dubey
r G. N. Tiwari and Swapnil Dubey 2010
Published by the Royal Society of Chemistry, www.rsc.org

vii
viii Preface
 importance of batteries;
 thermal modelling of solar systems;
 energy and exergy analysis;
 CO2 mitigation and carbon credit;
 economic analysis of PV/T systems, etc.

to undergraduate and post-graduate students, learners, scientists, profes-

sionals, practitioners and designers. To understand the above objectives a large
number of gures, solved examples and tables have been provided. At the end
of each chapter, problems/exercises have also been given, along with hints to
solve them.
We have drawn the material for inclusion in the book from a number of
references, which are cited at the appropriate places. These include: Solar
Energy, Fundamentals, Design, Modelling and Applications by G. N. Tiwari;
Fundamentals of Solar Dryers by G. N. Tiwari and P. Barnwal; Solar Engi-
neering of Thermal Processes by J. A. Due and W. A. Beckman; research
papers by Prof. H. A. Zondag, Prof. S. D. Hendrie, Prof. P. Raghuraman, Prof.
T. T. Chow, Prof. J. Prakash, Prof. Y. Tripanagnostopoulos, Prof. D. Ineld,
Prof. K. Nagano, Prof. L. W. Florschuetz, Prof. E. C. Kern Jr. and Prof. M. C.
Russell, Prof. D. L. Evans, Prof. S. A. Kalogirou, Prof. B. J. Huang, Prof. J. Ji,
Prof. H. P. Garg, Prof. A. D. Jones and Prof. C. P. Underwood, Prof. A. A.
Hegazy, Prof. K. Sopian, Prof. J. K. Tonui, Prof. J. Mumba, Prof. B. K. Bala,
Prof. I. Dincer, etc. We are highly appreciative of the courtesy of authors Prof.
T. T. Chow, China; Prof. Ivan Katic, Denmark; Prof. Niccolo Aste, Italy; Prof.
Gilles Notton, France; Prof. G. Fraisse, France; Prof. Abraham Kribus, Israel;
Prof. Y. B. Assoa, France; Prof. B. Robles-Ocampo, Mexico; Prof. H. Yang,
Hong Kong; Prof. Emmanuel Kymakis, Greece, for providing the photographs
of dierent PV/T systems. This list is incomplete and we apologize to anyone
we have omitted.
The present book has been divided into 10 chapters to study the basic
knowledge of photovoltaic thermal (PV/T) systems from thermal and electrical
points of view. Chapter 1 deals with availability of solar radiation emitted from
the Sun and its propagation through the atmosphere, as well as concepts of
greenhouse gases. It also includes importance and basics of solar radiation such
as atmosphere and SunEarth angles, cloudiness/haziness factor and total solar
radiation etc. Chapter 2 deals with the history/review of work done on pho-
tovoltaic (PV) integrated systems by various researchers. It includes air and
water systems, building integrated photovoltaic systems (BIPV) systems, tem-
perature-dependent electrical performance and market potential etc. The basics
of semiconductors and their characteristics, characteristics of solar cells in dark
and daylight situations and fundamentals of characteristic curves of semi-
conductors have been given in Chapter 3. The fundamentals of PV modules,
various combinations of solar cells and PV modules and array analyses have
been discussed in Chapter 4. The various types and working principles of
batteries with life and economics of batteries have been highlighted in Chapter
5. Chapter 6 provides the various case studies on BIPV and PV/T systems
Preface ix
related with eld exposures. The thermal modelling and results of various
congurations of PV/T systems, including air collectors, water heaters, dis-
tillation systems and dryers, have been discussed in Chapter 7. The energy and
exergy analysis on the basis of embodied energy of materials used for fabri-
cation of dierent components of PV/T systems has been highlighted in
Chapter 8. Chapter 9 deals with the net CO2 mitigation, carbon credit and
climate change. The techno-economics of the solar systems has been discussed
in Chapter 10.
SI units have been used throughout. Appendices have been given at end of
the book.
This book aims to provide a great insight into the subject, particularly to
learning students/professionals doing self-study. In spite of our best eorts,
some errors might have crept into the text. We fully welcome valuable sug-
gestions and comments from all readers for further improvement of the book in
the next edition.
It is our immense pleasure to express our heartfelt gratitude to Director (IIT
Delhi), Head (CES, IIT Delhi) and Prof. S. K. Dube, former director, IIT
Kharagpur, for their kind encouragement.
We acknowledge with thanks the nancial support by the Curriculum
Development Cell, IIT Delhi, for preparation of the book.
We are also thankful to Dr P. C. Pant, Scientist, Solar Energy Center,
MNRE, New Delhi, for providing the material on batteries and to Dr V. K.
Kaul, Central Electronics Limited, Sahibabad (UP), for providing the details
on SPV water pumping systems. We owe a special note of thanks to Dr Arvind
Tiwari, Dr P. Barnwal, Dr Shiv Kumar, Dr V. K. Dwivedi, Mrs Sujata Nayak,
Mr S. C. Solanki, Mr M. K. Gaur, Mr Basant Agarwal, Mr Jamil Ahmad, Mr
Rajeev Mishra, Mr Gaurav Singh, Mr. Abhishek Ranjan, Sh. Lakhmi Chand
and all the members of our group for their valuable support during preparation
of the manuscript.
Full credit is due to our publishers, RSC Publishing, Cambridge, UK, for
producing a nice print of the book.
Last, but not least, we express out deep gratitude to our respected parents,
Late Smt. Bhagirathi Tiwari, Late Sh. Bashisht Tiwari, Smt. Vandana Dubey
and Sh. Shailendra Kumar Dubey for their blessings, which helped us to reach
our target.

G. N. Tiwari
Swapnil Dubey
http://www.springer.com/978-1-84973-020-4