New proposal for photovoltaic-thermal solar energy utilization method

One of the most effective methods of utilizing solar energy is to use the sunlight and solar thermal energy such as a photovoltaic-thermal panel (PV/T panel) simultaneously. From such a viewpoint, systems using various kinds of PV panels were constructed in the world. In these panels, solar cells are set up at an absorber collecting solar thermal energy. Therefore, temperature of solar cell increases up to the prescribed temperature of thermal energy use, although it is lower than the cell temperature when using only solar cell panel. For maintaining cell conversion efficiency at the standard conditions, it is necessary to keep the cell at lower temperature. In this paper, electric and thermal energy obtained from a PV/T panel is evaluated in terms of energy. Based on this evaluation, the method of not to decrease cell conversion efficiency with collecting solar thermal energy was proposed.